


this is the tree of life, and this is how it grows

by Ruby_Casablanca



Category: The Old Guard (Comics), The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Sense8 (TV) Fusion, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Booker owns a little book shop in Paris, Catholic Guilt, Chemist!Quynh, Copley is Whispers, Copley is also Jonas, F/F, Implied/Referenced Torture, Joe does what he wants, M/M, Mentions of PTSD, Mercenary!Andy, Merrick Pharmaceuticals is the BPO, Multi, Mutual Pining, Nile is still a marine, No Immortality, Polyamorous Nile, Polyamorous established relationship, Priest!Nicky, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Stabbing, The old guard is a cluster, The world's most dysfunctional family
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:14:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 30,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26116291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruby_Casablanca/pseuds/Ruby_Casablanca
Summary: “You were dreaming again,” Brother Frattaroli says, his voice a deep and constant rumble. He does not sound surprised, nor should he. Nicolo knows his mind wanders, though never as far as to cross oceans. Not until today. “Where did you go?”.A thousand miles away, Yusuf Al-Kaysani closes his hand around thin air, wondering if men with eyes the color of sea glass exist outside his imagination..aka the Sense8 AU no one asked for
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Nile Freeman/Jay/Dizzy, Quynh | Noriko/Andy | Andromache of Scythia
Comments: 75
Kudos: 247





	1. seed

**Author's Note:**

> I love Sense8 and I love the Old Guard. Hence, this was born.
> 
> Title adapted from one of my favorite poems by Erin Hanson, the tree of life

The Sudan Op is supposed to be simple.

Get in, get the girls, get out.

Andy has done this job a dozen times over, could map each step in her sleep.

Take out the scouts. Cut the chain link fence. Disarm and disable the foot soldiers. Find the right building. Blow the door off the hinges. Breach.

It’s a textbook op. Until it’s not.

As Andy turns the final corner, the floor changes. Instead of dirt, her boots scuff against polished tile. What is supposed to be a dark, underground room is instead a glass-walled lobby flooding with light. There are no girls. There are, however, Asian business men and women walking past Andy as if she does not exist.

And there is a dark skinned man with a gaping stomach wound, blood dripping out his mouth, across his fingers as he points straight at her.

Andy lowers her gun.

“Motherfuc - “

…

Quynh is half way down the stairs when she sees the bleeding man.

Bleeding is too light a word. Bleeding is not enough to describe the deluge escaping the open wound, puddling down to the tile floor. Everything in the lobby is bright and white and clean. That much red strikes fear down to Quynh’s core.

Then he falls.

She can’t help it. She screams.

Screams and runs down the stairs as fast as her heels can take her and nearly twists her ankle on the landing. It will be worth it, Quynh thinks, if she can save this man before he loses all the blood his body has to offer.

How is he still living? How is he still breathing? How is he looking right at her, bloodstained fingers pointing her way, as if she is the one responsible for all this carnage.

Knees hit heavy on the floor beside his body. There will be bruises by midday, and rumors to follow. No respectable woman shows up to work with bruises on her knees. And yet, Quynh cannot be bothered to care. She only bothers cursing those around her, those so heartless as to keep walking by.

Not everyone is heartless. One straggler stops and kneels opposite Quynh, just as out of place as the man.

Her hair is a short, dark mess, her face smeared with dirt and blood, her armor just the same. Armor has no place in a pharmaceutical company, just like a militant white woman has no place in the business district of Hong Kong. Yet, there she is, Quynh’s lifeline. The only thing that stands out are her eyes: hard and blue and so mesmerizing that Quynh loses track of her thoughts. Only for a moment, but enough to ponder just how much this woman has seen to have eyes so cold.

The man chokes, and Quynh can think of nothing else except how he is going to die in her arms.

“Why won’t it stop!” she cries.

She keeps pressure on the wound, presses with all her might, but it’s no use.

“It’s not possible.”

The voice is soft and full of disbelief. Hands hover over Quynh’s own, battered knuckles wrapped in gauze ready to take charge of the situation. But when Quynh looks up, the short-haired woman is gone.

Quynh is alone, crying in the middle of the lobby, and her hands are clean.

…

The doorbell sounds, a familiar high-pitch chime that echoes off the shelves.

Another customer.

Booker swallows a groan. It’s not that he doesn’t like customers (he does...begrudgingly...only because he can’t pay the bills to keep the shop running without them). If he could spend all day every day with nothing but a bottle of whiskey and his books, he would. But he can’t. Bills demand to be payed, demons demand attention.

So he spends his days procuring the occasional first edition Don Quixote for whatever buyer lines up first. If his morning coffee contains a little hair of the dog, well, that’s been him and Cervantes.

Eight in the morning is too early for sales, first editions be damned. The only reason Booker opens the shop before noon is so he can decompress before the day kicks into high gear. High gear usually means a steady flow of two to three hipsters per hour, and if Booker is lucky, they’re the quiet brooding type. Worst case, they’re the fake-deep type that reek of marijuana and patchouli and like to ask questions about the meaning of the universe despite the sign on the door that specifically states not to speak to him unless it’s to ring something up.

This customer is not like any of those.

She is surprisingly unassuming, young, and strong. Very strong. The definition in her arms is evident even from where Booker sits, muscles flexing as she runs fingers down worn spines. She is not dressed for the weather, legs and midriff exposed, open-toed sandals on her feet. She is dressed for the beach, not the start of a crisp Parisian autumn.

Must be a tourist then.

Booker has nothing against tourists either. He likes watching them and dreaming up their perfect, civilian lives. Their purchases make up a fair portion of his sales every year. He just doesn’t understand why they have to play their music so goddamn loud. The sound vibrates as if Booker’s ears are connected directly to her headphones. It’s wreaking havoc on his hangover.

“Hey, knock it off!” Booker shouts. He usually advocates for quiet voices inside the shop, but this is an exception. At this volume, the tourist will not hear him any other way.

Booker absolutely does not feel pride at startling her. Eyes, dark and bewildered, search for him as she pulls out her headphones. When she finds him, she smiles, apologetic.

“Sorry, what?”

Ah, American. That explains a lot.

“I said, turn your shitty music down, please.”

Immediately, her smile falls into a glare so impassioned it promises to turn the altercation from verbal to physical.

“Hey man, fuck you, Frank Ocean isn’t - “

She looks out the window. Really looks. The woman walking her dog is not worth quite the level of staring this woman is giving. But, then again, tourists will find just about anything to gawk at.

“Paris,” she says, quiet as a breath and full of disbelief. “Is this Paris? I am in Paris?”

There are many unpleasant, sarcastic things Booker could say. There are equally as many jokes he could make about oblivious tourists. But he doesn’t get to voice any of them.

This time when the bell rings, there is an honest-to-god hipster at the door, brow furrowed from underneath a threadbare beanie.

_“À qui parlez-vous?”_

Booker frowns. Has the overgrown fringe made this kid blind? He turns. The woman is gone, and so is the music.

_“Personne.”_

That does nothing to comfort the hipster. Booker only succeeds in confusing the poor kid further. He doesn’t care. He’s too caught up in his thoughts, too busy figuring out how a woman could sneak out his shop through the only exit without being seen. That, or she’s hiding amongst the shelves, waiting for the opportunity to blow out his eardrums.

Booker watches the door the rest of the day, just in case.

...

Nile swears she entered a record shop.

The sign outside even has music notes. So how she ends up smack dab in the middle of the dustiest little book shop in the world is a mystery. The whole place oozes charm, oak shelves crammed full of books both old and new, but all used. They sit on the shelves with no rhyme or reason, poetry next to science fiction next to autobiographies. It makes for an exciting search, not knowing what she’ll stumble upon next.

Someone shouts at her, drawing her out of her bubble. Her eyes snap to the man at the register, scruffy-faced and haggard. Hungover, then. Nile’s been there more than a couple times herself, and she smiles in sympathy.

“Sorry, what?” she asks, pulling out her headphones so that he won’t have to repeat himself again.

“I said, turn down your shitty music, please.”

The 'please' is tacked on as an afterthought, insincere. He doesn’t seem remorseful of his rudeness, blue eyes dull and full of spite. Nile sees men like him every day: assholes for no reason. Every time she encounters one, they live to regret it. Nile doesn’t even realize that his accent is off, more guttural and the vowels are all wrong, as she goes on the war path.

“Hey man, fuck you, Frank Ocean isn’t - “

Words die in her throat. Anger is replaced by something else, something impossible.

Because that is the Eiffel fucking Tower.

“Paris,” she says, out loud but mostly for herself. “Is this Paris? I am in Paris?”

Is she hallucinating? Is she finally losing her mind? The doctors told her it would be possible to start seeing or hearing things that aren’t there. They told her that coming back from war would be hard, that it would take time to separate nightmare from reality. But this? Where did this fall on the spectrum?

The bell rings, and someone else comes in. Someone else who can’t see her. If that isn’t weird enough, Nile realizes his words sound wrong because he’s not speaking English. He’s speaking French. And she can understand it.

Nile backs up, one step tripping after another, until she collides with the bookshelf. None of the books fall, none of them even shake with her impact. Like she isn’t there at all.

She turns the corner. The next aisle is records.

The store is transformed, bright yellow carpets and orange painted walls. Nineties music blares over the speakers, casting out the forgotten bops ofone-hit-wonders. The music shop. It is so different from dark wooden shelves crammed full of sun-yellowed pages. There are no books, no dusty shelves, no ambient sounds in a lilting language so foreign yet so familiar on her tongue.

She shakes her head; the store remains vibrant. Maybe she really is seeing things.

Nile didn’t know French this morning. Now, she hums La Vie en Rose under her breath in perfect time. Edith Piaf’s face is the first face Nile sees as she passes the international section. It’s worth a buy.

Outside, Jay and Dizzy are parked on the corner, seeking shade under the shadow of a street sign. Los Angeles is still hot this time of year, and all the kids are back at school, making for a perfect beach day. Nile’s been looking forward to this day for weeks.

Nile jumps in shotgun and Jay puts the car in drive, top down and wind ripping through their hair.

“‘Bout time,” Jay sighs, rolling her eyes. Nile can tell even though they’re hidden under bug-eyed sunglasses. “What took you so long?”

“Dunno. Couldn’t decide.”

“I didn’t know anyone still listened to this stuff,” Dizzy says as she leans over the seat takes the record from Nile’s hands. “Not really the kind of mood we were aiming for.”

“It’s Paris.” The Eiffel Tower looked so real, so much more attainable than her usual dreams. Nile can’t shake the feeling like she left part of herself there. The urge to return itches under her skin. “We should go, make it an anniversary trip or something.”

“I like the sound of that,” Jay says with a smile, tipping her head back to the sun.

Nile nudges Jay with her foot. Dizzy continues to start at Edith’s face, contemplating.

“I used to have this plan that I would move to Paris and live in this crappy little apartment, work in the cafe underneath while writing my novel, and fall in love with a tragically detached French girl.”

Jay tosses back her head and laughs while Nile kisses Dizzy on the cheek.

“You never told us that before,” Nile says, enjoying the way Dizzy blushes.

“Plans change.”

“Damn right,” Jay says, taking the last exit toward the beach. “We are way better than any detached French girl.”

...

Church bells echo down the halls of the cloister, signaling the start of afternoon prayers. The brothers, no doubt, are already gathering in the sacristy, preparing to enter the chapel at the sound of the twelfth bell. They will count their ranks, each head accounted for.

  
Each head except Nicolo’s.

Nicolo’s head busies itself looking up. It is a beautiful day to spend in the garden, nothing but clear blue skies and bright sun, not a cloud in sight. The kind of day Nicolo intends to savor far, far away from the dark, oppressive walls of the chapel.

Brother Frattaroli will worry, Nicolo knows, and feels a pang of guilt at causing his mentor unnecessary trouble. But Brother Frattaroli is a kind man, a forgiving man, the kind of man Nicolo has spent the past two years striving to be. Brother Frattaroli will understand why Nicolo cannot attend. He will take one look at Nicolo, see the tension in his shoulders and the circles around his eyes, and take pity on him just as he has before.

Nicolo relies too heavily on that understanding. He knows, and yet, he cannot help but abuse that understanding. Just another reason to question why he is here at all.

The routine, the space, the purpose are supposed to bring him peace. Peace, it seems, is more evasive than expected.

The closest Nicolo comes to peace is here, in the prayer garden - this patch of green space barely large enough to fit a bench and a sparse few rosebushes. A shriveled stump is all that remains of the lemon tree Nicolo planted upon his arrival. He tries not to think about what that means. Between the lemon tree and the dreams of the man with the bleeding stomach, he is beginning to wonder if God is trying to send him a message.

Nicolo inhales, anticipating the ghostly scent of citrus. Instead, the smell of salt and brine assaults his nose. There is wind on his cheeks, almost violent in its gust, too strong to be fantasy. And when he opens his eyes, the monastery is gone, replaced with the heaving deck of a ship.

Men run all around him, yellow weather gear rippling in the wind, boots sloshing through ankle-deep puddles. The salt water soaks through the bottom of Nicolo’s cassock, wet and heavy even though he knows this can’t be anything but his imagination.

He is sitting in the prayer garden. The sun is shining. There has been no rain for two weeks.

And yet, he is wet.

The ship rocks violently with the waves, and Nicolo nearly falls overboard out of sheer unpreparedness. He makes his way to the edge, unsteady as he sways, to get a white-knuckled grip on the railing. Despite the fear of falling, he can’t help the laugh that bubbles in his throat.

“Hey! Get away from the edge!”

There is a man shouting at him, rushing Nicolo’s way, his dark beard speckled with drops of water, dark eyes obscured by a flopping yellow hat.

Nicolo does as he is told, steps away from the edge, away from the sight of foaming white waves. He waits patiently as the man studies him, brow furrowed with confusion the closer he gets.

“How did you get on board?”

“I don’t know…”

Nicolo has never had a dream this vivid, never had a dream where anyone has asked him ‘how’. It is not the point of dreams to know the ‘how’, but the ‘why’. And why, indeed, would God place Nicolo on this boat? Is there meaning to this too? The sailor offers no explanation. He simply stares.

The sun is different here, more brutal as the waves reflect the shine. Nicolo closes his eyes against the onslaught. He misses the prayer garden. The light there is gentler, just as gentle as the touch on his shoulder.

Eyes open, and the boat is gone. The air smells of freshly-turned earth. The ground is solid beneath his feat. The touch is Brother Frattaroli’s, thick palm gripping the cloth near Nicolo’s clavicle. Strange, that Nicolo thought the touch was gentle. He could swear the touch was different, fingers thinner, more calloused and careful. Nicolo wonders why he feels disappointment where he should feel relief.

“You were dreaming again,” Brother Frattaroli says, his voice a deep and constant rumble. He does not sound surprised, nor should he. Nicolo knows his mind wanders, though never as far as to cross oceans. Not until today. “Where did you go?”

…

A thousand miles away, Yusuf Al-Kaysani closes his hand around thin air, wondering if men with eyes the color of sea glass exist outside his imagination.


	2. sprout

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow! Thanks everyone for your kind words and kudos! I had no idea there was anyone other than me interested in an idea like this. This chapter is more of the cluster getting to know one another. They get up to shenanigans, stakes are raised, and I take inspiration from Kala's miracles speech from 2x1 at one point. Hope everyone likes it!

Nile can’t help it. She screams.

Because there is a woman sitting on her toilet covered in dirt and blood and who knows what else. A woman with a gun holstered to each thigh, one in hand, and an axe strapped to her back. A woman who is not Jay nor Dizzy.

Jay and Dizzy are not home. They are not here to save Nile from being butchered by the crazy woman with the blue eyes of death.

“Relax, kid. I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Says the woman with a loaded weapon,” Nile says. She can’t stop the sarcasm; even in the face of death, it’s reflexive. “How the hell did you get in here anyway?”

The window above the bath is old. Nile is pretty sure it was painted shut back in the seventies.

The woman rolls her eyes. “It’s not like I asked to be here.”

She’s looking at something over her shoulder, in the shower. No, something beyond. Like she can see something Nile can’t.

And then it clicks.

“You’re like the guy in Paris.”

The woman looks at Nile like she’s grown a second head.

Whatever snarky reply the woman prepares is lost under a spray of bullets. Rough hands pull her down, and suddenly, Nile is crouched behind a shipping crate, bare feet cold against cracked concrete.

“Jesus!” Nile shouts as the wall above her is blown to bits. “Do something!”

“What do you think I’m doing!” Andy shouts back and returns fire. A whole round of shots emptied into the air. Hopefully a few land in guts. “Either shut up or be useful!”

She shoves a gun into Nile’s hands. Pulling the trigger, embracing for recoil, these are reflexes Nile will never forget no matter how much time has passed. A piece of Nile slots back into place as she opens fire. Never the best shot, but a consistent one.

Together, the two of them rush their attackers. Nile moves like she has never moved before, completely in synch with the stranger at her side. She can do things, things that the Marines never taught, things that are more martial arts than combat defense. The way she moves is a mystery and a terror and a blur. Before she knows it, the men are on the ground, dead more likely than not. She doesn’t feel remorse, but her body still shakes with adrenaline.

The most bizarre part is that Nile is still standing her bathroom.

“You’re good, kid,” the woman says, blood in her teeth. She spits in the sink, bright red splattering against white porcelain. “What’s your name?”

“Nile.” She doesn’t know why she’s telling this absolute mad woman her name. It’s one more thing she can use against Nile, track her down, and kill her. But the blood in the sink, dirt and mud streaking the tile Nile just cleaned last week, has Nile more annoyed than scared. “And stop calling me kid. We’re the same age.”

“I’ll stop calling you kid when you stop acting like one.”

Nile’s taken her fair share of patronizing. To be a Marine is to be broken down and built back up again, the perfect obedient soldier. This woman is doing none of them. Her cruelty is for cruelty’s purpose. Nile has no reason to stand there, in her own home, and take it.

“Listen, lady, I don’t want your problems. So take your piss poor attitude and get the hell out of my house.”

At least the woman doesn’t shoot her in the head.

“This fight’s not over. None of it is. It’s just starting.” And what the fuck does that mean? Nile has heard enough. The woman picks up on the hint, jerks her head and cocks her gun. “See you around, kid.”

The mud and blood disappear to the soundtrack of gunshots. Nile has the sinking feeling she’ll be having these conversations more often than she’d like.

…

Andy is done with this shit.

She’s done being shot at, done being stabbed, done running, done trying to talk sense into stubborn marines. 100% done. Now, if only the people pursuing her could get that through their thick heads.

She stumbles into an alley, kicks a door down, then uses all her strength to seal it shut again.

Turns out, there’s no point.

Back to the wood - polished wood, because what fiftieth-floor office wouldn’t be complete without top notch finishes - Andy sees she is not alone. The woman from the lobby sits behind a metal desk, dabbing furiously at her eyes. Or, she was before Andy barged in to give her the scare of a lifetime.

“You.”

“Help me.”

The words are out before Andy can stop them, like she never stood a chance at filtering herself. The woman reaches to touch her shoulder, to the exact place where Andy hurts, as if it hurts her too. Andy’s been ignoring that particular wound since she shot the son of a bitch who gave it to her. Now, the pain cripples.

Andy slumps down the door. She would fall if not for the woman’s supernatural ability to sense her every move.

The woman guides Andy to her chair, sits her down, fusses over her like a mother would a child, which is ridiculous because they have to be the same age. Layers get peeled back, armor abandoned. Andy isn’t sure if she’s undressing herself, or if this woman is doing it for her. It doesn’t matter, not when the lacerated flesh of her shoulder is exposed to the world in all its gory glory.

The woman clicks her tongue, shakes her head, but does not go far. She reaches into her desk, pulls out a small first aid kit. There isn’t much inside excluding the standard antiseptic and bandages, but Andy’s made do with less.

Hydrogen peroxide stings like a bitch every time. She hisses through her teeth and rides out the burn.

“What happened?” Quynh - her name is Quynh, Andy is as certain of it as the hands on her skin, so soft, so gentle. Hands that have never held a gun - asks.

“Got stabbed.”

“And the person who stabbed you?”

“He’ll need a lot more than a couple of bandaids.”

One dark eyebrow arches, unamused. It’s hard to tell exactly what Quynh is thinking. Andy is usually good at reading people. Then again, Andy is usually good at patching herself up too. This is an irritating change of pace.

“Thank you,” Quynh says, irritating Andy further. 

“Shouldn’t I be thanking you?”

“Before. With the man. You were the only one who stopped.”

Andy huffs and rolls her eyes. It is easier to brush guilt aside than embrace it. “I didn’t do much of anything.”

“Neither did I.” Quynh has questions, that much is clear. She looks out the wall of windows to the world beyond, as if the answers she seek lie somewhere in the clouds. “Apparently it was all in my head. No one there. My supervisors pulled the footage, showed me making a fool of myself in front of the entire company.”

“Are you gonna get fired?”

“Do you care?”

Honesty is such a rarity in the world they live in. Andy savors it, savors the quirk of a smile in Quynh’s lips as she awaits an answer.

“I’m - “

“Andromache.” Quynh’s smile turns from a quirk to a full smirk. “I know your name, just as you know mine.”

“Call me Andy.” No one has called in her Andromache in a very, _very_ long time. So long that the name feels as foreign as a stranger, a girl lost in a memory in the deep dark abyss of Andy’s memory.

Quynh steps away, and the wound is bandaged as well as can be expected. Impressive work for a civilian.

“So, Andy, why are people stabbing you?”

“I was burned on an Op. Pretty sure it was a set up. Never had a dissatisfied client. Never been set up before. The only reason I can think of why is that on the same day, I walked into a lobby half way across the world and watched a ghost bleed out.”

Quynh’s smirk returns. “That’s the only reason?”

Fair point. “I have a lot of enemies. They’d rather shoot me dead than go to the trouble of catching me alive.”

“What a world you live in.”

Quynh’s voice is sad. Not quite pity, not quite mournful. Andy can’t remember her mother’s face, how it twisted whenever Andy did something reckless, how it crumpled when Andy inevitably got hurt, but if she has to guess, it would look a lot like Quynh’s right now.

“I could say the same about you.”

Memories make her prickle, make her walls shudder closed.

“Watch your back,” Andy says, turning away from Quynh. Andy’s not really in this office. Whatever hole she’s in, she’s not safe there. She has to move. She’s wasted too much time already. “You can’t trust anyone, not even me.”

The door is easier to kick down this time, wood splintering under the force of Andy’s boot. Her shoulder aches, but the bandages hold firm. She has no time to think about pain, or memories, or the soft quirk of red lips.

There is only time to reload and jump headfirst into the unknown.

…

  
Yusuf wakes far before the dawn.

He does not control when his muse strikes, does not control his mind nor his body. He lets himself go, lets himself get lost in his art. Here, in this place, between jobs, is the best time to let his imagination run wild. And run wild it has. Between visions of dying men and priests, he is not sure which one holds more sketches in his sketchbook.

This morning, it is the priest who catches his eye. Yusuf has drawn his face a hundred times over. Could draw that face in his sleep. That face both haunts and captivates him, even more than the dying man. There is something to be said about a man so stoic, a man with so many secrets.

_What is your name?_ Yusuf asks him in his dreams. _Where do I find you?_

Dreams are a place of inquisition and obsession. Yusuf does not like to think of this as an obsession. Obsession is a dirty word, a word shrouded in vice and the worst of intentions. Yet, it is the only word powerful enough to describe how a moment’s meeting could bury a man so completely under his skin.

When the sketch is done, light is streaming through the open window. And Yusuf is not alone.

“Expecting someone else?”

“Maybe.”

Yusuf tells himself not to be too disappointed. It is not like he has any control over this. He is at the mercy of his mind, or whatever force that pushes these people into his path. If anything, this new introduction will add another striking visage to his collection. Her dark skin glows, her frame exudes power and strength, and her bone structure…well…he could spend days perfecting the arch of her nose to the bow of her upper lip.

This new visitor sits in the seat across from his and studies his work.

“He’s beautiful.”

“He is, isn’t he.” Yusuf cannot help but smile. “I see him in my dreams. I feel as though I’ve know him my whole life.” He turns that smile to the visitor, undeterred when she does not smile back. “I get that feeling with you, too.”

Frustration furrows her brow. “Why us?”

“I don’t know.”

Yusuf spends his life as a series of unknowns. He prefers it that way. One is privy to witnessing the wonders of the world that way. This connection, however, is one of the few things Yusuf would not mind figuring out. They are strangers. They come from different worlds. There must be a reason to the madness.

“You’re a whole hell of a lot better than the others,” she says.

“Oh?” This is news. “There are others?”

“Yeah. Two, that I know of: some guy in Paris and the woman with the guns. She’s not friendly. Nearly got me shot.” She looks back down at the portrait, at the mole on his jaw and the striking color of his eyes. “Plus you and the man on the paper makes five. Who knows who else.”

“Oh what wonders these minds hold.” That, Yusuf decides, is enough revelation for one day. His guest looks ashen, troubled. Unacceptable. “A problem for another time, hmm? What we need now is coffee.”

“It’s the middle of the night for me.”

A weak excuse. “Were you really planning on sleeping?”

“Fair enough.”

Yusuf busies himself with the drinks while his guest flips through his sketches. He does not mind sharing his art. It is nothing profound. The wonder in her eyes tells Yusuf she thinks otherwise.He says nothing as he stirs in a spoonful of sugar, a splash of cream. Somehow, he knows that is just how she likes it. He prefers his black, but for a moment, the sweetness tempts him.

“Oh my god,” she moans into her mug, savoring another sip. “This is amazing.”

“Nothing quite like pure, Moroccan coffee.” He watches her, taking in every flicker of pleasure that crosses her face. It is so rare that he gets to see the things he takes for granted appreciated through new eyes.“Everyone else gets the preserved, watered-down bullshit. But this? Fresh from the source? Best in the world.”

“Can you make me coffee every morning? Because damn. I would kill my mother for this. Not really. Maybe.”

He laughs. “Sure. Anytime you want.”

Conversation dies shortly after, but neither of them needs it. A muezzin rouses calls for morning prayer, melodic chanting carrying across the city. Soon after, the sounds of the marketplace pick up. They tip their heads back to the sun and take it in. And go through another two cups of coffee in the process.

...

The office has a strict no smoking policy. If any employee wants to use their lunch to sneak off and light up behind the building, that is up to them. Quynh would rather have a smoke than eat a salad, but it looks like she will be having neither.

She can’t find her damn cigarettes.

Frustration builds, threatening an outburst.

First the scene in the lobby - a scene which earned her a meeting with her supervisors concerning her emotional fragility, as they so kindly put it - then patching Andy back together, and now this. She would show them emotional fragility. She would show everyone just how unstable she can be. If she doesn’t get her cigarette.

She digs through her drawers, through carefully organized files and reports, through months of data research, through…liquor store receipts? Broken spines of old novels?

The contents of her desk take a turn toward the unfamiliar the deeper she goes. When she slams the drawer shut, wood creaks where metal should ring out. This is not her desk.

This is not her office.

This is a rather dingy apartment, small, cluttered. Quynh cannot live in clutter. Clutter makes her feel trapped. Clutter makes her skin crawl.

Clutter does not stop her from tearing through this apartment like a tornado.

Quynh is half way through the underwear drawer when the front door opens. A man with a scruffy blond beard walks through, looking tired and far older than his actual age. Perhaps, with a shower and sobriety, he could be a handsome man.

Handsome or not, he makes her smile.

“Booker!” She has never been so happy to see a white man in her life, so happy that she doesn’t question how she knows his name without introduction. She flings a pair of boxers over her shoulder, unimportant, in favor of speaking face to face. “Nice to finally meet you. Now, where do you keep them?”

Booker stills like a deer caught in headlights. He stares at Quynh, face ashen, like he sees a ghost. And, in a way, he does. Quynh knows she is in her office. She knows that as surely as she knows the sun will rise in the morning. She does not stand in the same room as Booker. And yet, there she is.

“Them?” he asks, when his mouth finally starts working. His voice is rusty, unused, like this is the first time he has spoken all day.

“I would kill for a cigarette.”

Booker reaches into his jacket pocket, producing a lighter and a pack of Marlboros. Quynh wrinkles her nose. Usually she rolls her own, but accepts whatever nicotine she can get. It’s that kind of day.

“Look at this,” she says as she reaches for the lighter, hands trembling. It’s a wonder she doesn’t send them up in flames. “Haven’t been able to get them to stop.”

The first drag of tobacco settles something restless. It feels like euphoria, and she luxuriates in the drag, lips curling around the cigarette in a smile. It’s not the best she’s ever had, it’s not even real, but it’s sweet release all the same.

“You’re Quynh.”

She hums her approval. Booker looks mildly upset at being right.

“How do I know that?”

“I’ve stopped asking why and how. Makes all this easier.” The cigarette eases her nerves, makes it easier to speak in such blasé terms. “We’re connected, who knows to who else. My only concern is what to do with it.”

Her eyes look to the laptop, her laptop, open on his table. How something could exist in two different places baffles her. Something other than herself, that is.

Booker leans over the table, red-rimmed eyes pushing their limits to make sense of what lies on the screen. It’s not a lot, but it’s a start.

“You’ve been doing research.”

“I’m a scientist. Research is what I do.” Smoke billows from her lips, hot and bitter, and as it dissolves she imagines her fears dissolving with it. She has so many fears. No amount of smoke could dispel them all. All she can do is try to understand them. “There’s another. A woman. A fighter - “

“ - Andy.”

Quynh nods once.

“She thinks we’re in danger. That someone, something, is looking for us.”

Booker does not like that. He does not like that at all. But he does not curse her. He does not run away.

“Yeah, well, if we’re in some sort of danger, best to do this off Internet Explorer.” He cuts Quynh a look. “Seriously?”

His thoughts become hers. _Multi-million dollar company, and they still use Internet Explorer. That is just wrong. So, so wrong._

Quynh shrugs, unbothered. Computers aren’t her strong suit, but they are Booker’s. She watches as he takes his time programming, a stream of green code on black that slowly comes to make sense the longer she stays in his headspace.

“Here, no one should be able to see you now. Completely invisible.”

“Thank you.”

It is Booker’s turn to shrug. “Computers are what I do. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need a drink.”

She catches him on the wrist before he can go. “Be careful.”

Booker ducks his head and exits the way he came. He leaves his cigarettes.

_Surely_ , Quynh thinks, _he can spare a few more_.

…

Nicolo hides.

He tells himself he hides for peace of mind. He tells himself he does not hide from Brother Frattaroli. Despite his size and stature, Brother Frattaroli is not a man to fear. Brother Frattaroli will not express his disappointment with pain and blood. He will, however, express his disappointment in Nicolo’s absence from prayer with undeserving kindness and compassion.

Nicolo does not want kindness. Nicolo does not want compassion. Nicolo wants wants solitude.

The prayer garden is empty, and yet, Nicolo is not alone.

The man from the ship is there, except he looks different this time, more human with all the layers stripped away. His beard is trimmed, hair out of his eyes, though that could be due to the lack of water. Instead of wet, Nicolo feels oppressive heat, an exact opposite of their previous encounter.

The man does not acknowledge Nicolo’s presence, completely absorbed in his art. Charcoal-stained hands wipe away the last remnants of dust. Underneath lies a coffee-stained portrait of a woman, dark skinned and beautiful, yet familiar in a way Nicolo cannot place.

“Ah, hello,” the man greets Nicolo as if he is an old friend. “I was hoping to see you again.”

He places his pencil down, wipes his hands on his pants. Nicolo wonders if he knows there is charcoal on his nose. Would it be rude to wipe it away?

“Are you a vision?” Nicolo asks instead. “Were you sent by God to test me?”

His smile widens, blinding white and mesmerizing. “If your God sent me, then this world is truly in trouble.”

Jokes. Nicolo wishes he could take these matters so lightly.

“If you are not sent by God, and you are not a figment of my own imagination, then who are you? You seem so…real.”

Nicolo does not mean to touch. The impulse expresses itself before he has time to stop his hand from reaching.

“I am real. Just as real as you.” For a moment, their fingers brush, tangle, then fall. Whatever impulses drove Nicolo to touch, this man does not speak on them. He brings that hand to his chest, right over his heart. “My name is Yusuf.”

“Nicolo.”

It is only fair that they stand on equal footing. And where they stand is strange indeed, no longer in the prayer garden but somewhere else entirely. Dirt floors dust the edges of Nicolo’s cassock, little clouds of red whirling around his steps, rising past ancient, cracking walls to the low-hanging ceiling. In many ways, this place is no different than the monastery, but different all the same.

“Where are you?” he asks, leaning out the window to get a better look at his surroundings. At least they are on dry land this time, free from the rolling waves of the sea.

“Marrakech.”

Out of all the bizarre things, this is the part Nicolo has the hardest time believing. He has never stepped foot out of Italy, never had the urge, not even on his darkest days. Italy is his home. And yet, the heat of the Moroccan sun, the smell of clay-baked walls and spice, feels just as much home as anywhere else.

“You live here?”

“Just passing through,” Yusuf says with a wave of his hand, as if this is nothing and everything at once. “I’ve lived in a dozen places, visited dozens more. I travel anywhere and everywhere I want.”

Envy stabs Nicolo somewhere around the gut, old and dull and aching. “Ah. It must be nice to be so free.”

“Sometimes. But other times, it would be nice to rest.” Now, it is Yusuf’s turn to be envious, wistful eyes taking in Nicolo’s home. And when, exactly, did they switch sides? Nicolo hears aggressive Arabic haggling from the market down the street and the drone of solemn kyries all at once. If Yusuf struggles separating spaces, he hides his struggle behind curiosity. He walks the perimeter of the garden, touching the leaves of the bushes that yet to bear roses. “Somewhere like here, actually. Where is here?”

“Prayer garden, at the monastery of Santo Stefano in Genoa.”

Dark eyes spark playful, full of disbelief. “Italy? Really?”

“Really.”

Yusuf exhales a whistle, shaking his head and knocking loose a few curls in the process. “You must have done something truly wonderful to live amongst such beauty.”

“There are those far more deserving than me.” Nicolo finds it hard to look Yusuf in the eye, shame prickling down his spine as he brushes his demons aside. “I’m lucky, I suppose. I try to be worthy of God’s grace every day.”

“I envy you.” Impossible, Nicolo wants to say, but he holds his tongue. There is nothing in his life worth envying. Yusuf must be toying with him. But Yusuf seems so open, so honest. “I wish I believed in something as strongly as you do your God.”

“What do you believe in, then?”

“Fate. Circumstance. Miracles.”

“You believe in miracles, but not God?”

“Not all miracles come from God.” Yusuf takes a step closer to Nicolo, so close that it would be nothing at all to close the space between them and breathe as one. And yet, Yusuf chooses to pluck a rose from the bush instead. “I can sit in an apartment in Marrakech, the taste of strong coffee on my tongue, the heat of the sun on my skin, and at the same time be here, in this garden, with you, the smell of roses tickling my nose. How can that be anything less than a miracle?”

The rose winds up tucked behind Nicolo’s ear, calloused finger tips ghosting over the shell. Breath catches in Nicolo’s throat. He follows those fingers, as familiar as his own and yet, so wildly different. Yusuf’s touch lights something in him, something that sets his very soul on fire. It’s the feeling Nicolo thought he would find in God.

When the touch leaves, Nicolo looks up to find Yusuf has too. All that remains is the rose.

Nicolo reaches to remove it and his thumb pricks a thorn.

_Madre di Dio!_ It is a sin to take the Lord’s name in vain; he will say many Our Fathers during evening prayer to atone. But Nicolo cannot see past the sharp sting of pain. 

Blood wells up from the cut, livid red as if to scream _you are flying too close to the sun._

…

When Booker unlocks his apartment five hours and half a bottle of whiskey later, there is no one to greet him. No crazy Asian lady turning his drawers inside out. No conspiracy theories threatening his wellbeing. Just his dusty cabinets, empty fridge, and tired mattress. As it should be.

He is half way to blissful nothing when there’s a knock at the door.

Booker curses. Who the fuck could possibly want something this late at night?

He opens the door, and remembers all of Quynh’s warnings a moment too late. In the doorway stands a sharp man in a three-piece suit. He holds out a badge - Copley, it reads - as if that means something. Booker knows trouble before it smiles at him.

“ _Bon soir, Monsieur le Livre_. I’ve been looking for you.”


	3. stem

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW for vague references to PTSD, 9/11, violence, and gore toward the end. Also, went to some liberties giving the old guard family members.
> 
> Thanks a million for everyone's kind words and kudos on the last chapter! Hope you like this one :)

The man known as Copley stands outside Booker’s door, waiting patiently for Booker’s mind to catch up with the rest of him.

_Fuck._

_Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck_.

“May I come in, Sebastien?”

_No. Absolutely not._ So many alarms go off in Booker’s mind he might as well be a police siren. He cannot say what compels him to open the door wider, to step aside, to let this strange man who knows his name into his apartment.

“Booker,” he corrects, watching as Copley surveys his living room. “I don’t use that name anymore.”

“Of course. I understand. My deepest condolences.”

Booker bristles. Fuck him for acting like he knows anything about what Booker is going through. Fuck him and his fake condolences. Booker doubts anything coming out of this man’s mouth is sincere.

“Who are you? Why are you here?”

If Copley is bothered by the first degree interrogation, he keeps his composure. He sits on Booker’s shitty couch and lounges back, propping one leg on the other, like they are old friends about to share stories.

“I knew your father.”

More lies.

“My father is dead.”

“Forgive me, I meant your cluster father, Lykon.” As if that makes any more goddamn sense. Booker has half a mind to toss the man out. “He and I were close. Like brothers.”

“Does that make you my uncle?” Booker quips, unkindly. He knows he’s being a dick, but this man is wasting his time talking in riddles.

“I suppose so.”

“You said a word, _cluster_.”

“The people you keep seeing, the ones you cannot explain. The ones you know without ever having met. Those are you cluster.” Now, Booker is intrigued.Copley has vital information about what is going on that Booker needs, and he knows it. It’s in the way Copley smiles, relaxed and unbothered, like a cat toying with a mouse. “All sensates are connected to each other in some way. All it takes is a bit of eye contact, and bang! - “ Copley snaps his fingers “- a two way road into each other’s minds. But your cluster, those are the ones whose lives intertwine with yours. You shared your first breath, now you share your every thought, every memory, every skill.”

As someone who values privacy, Booker feels impulsive horror at being so known. He plays things close to the chest, keeps his private affairs private. He tried opening up once, and for a time he had happiness, but then…well…He does not want to be seen by anyone ever again.

“Lykon and I, we worked for the same company. Have you ever heard of the Biologic Preservation Organization?”

Booker shakes his head.

“It used to be bigger, more widespread. Now, we are left picking up the pieces of a once-great empire.” Copley leans forward as if sharing a secret. “The BPO dedicated itself to understanding the sensate phenomenon. They wanted to figure out how we work, why we are what we are.”

“And did they?”

“Unfortunately not.” Of course not, Booker thinks all too cynically. Copley, however, is undeterred. “There are others, a very troublesome cluster, who do not see things the way Lykon and I do. They sought to destroy the BPO. But your father understood what was at stake: our way of life. Homo sapiens are the most aggressive, bloodthirsty species on the planet. He knew that the only way to survive was to work towards an understanding. He was willing to give his life for it.”

Booker does not know what to say, or if words are even necessary. Copley seems plenty content to hear himself talk. He takes Booker's silence as acceptance, and Booker does nothing to convince him otherwise.

“These are trying times for both yourself and those connected to you. So much is changing, so much left uncertain. I would like to be a mentor to you, to be a valued resource to you and your cluster.”

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t take you up on that right away.”

“Of course. By all means, convene with your cluster. Come to a decision together.”

Copley stands and smooths down his suit. It is far too fancy, far too out of place for Booker’s run down dump. Everything about Copley radiates money and power and influence. So why does he want to help Booker so damn bad?

Booker does not stop asking himself that as he escorts Copley to the door.

“You can trust me Booker, and in time you will.” Copley says, and reaches into his jacket pocket. “For now, a parting gift.”

He presses a small glass vial into Booker’s hand. It’s hard to see in the dingy lighting of the hall, but there’s no mistaking what’s rattling around inside.

“Drugs?”

“Blockers. Medical grade created by my friends at Merrick Pharmaceuticals. They will cut off your connection from your cluster.”

Booker’s pulse skips.

“And why the hell would I need these?”

“To make you able to pass as a sapien. Make things a little more tolerable, a little more…normal.”

It’s like Copley sees him, _really sees him_ for what he is. Booker doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like Copley and his charm and false condolences and fancy suits and tempting little black pills.

Booker means to slam the door in Copley’s face. He really does. But by the time the shock wears off, Copley is gone.

…

Today is a bad day.

Today brings nothing but rain so hard it floods the floors and leaks through the ceiling. The rain means no time in the garden. The rain means the halls cast shadows in already-dark places. The rain means extra prayers and scripture studies with the brothers. Nicolo’s mind exhausts itself before midday, but there is no escape from Brother Frattaroli’s gaze. Not while the sun hides behind storm clouds.

The rain brings back memories as well. The bad kind. The dark kind.

It is there, in the chapel, Nicolo lights a candle and prays for strength, for perseverance. _If he could just outlast the rain…_

“Hello Nicolo.”

That is a woman’s voice. Very distinct, higher in pitch. There are no women allowed in the monastery.

  
Yet, when Nicolo turns, there she stands - short in stature yet her presence commands attention. Her dress is sharp, as is the cut of her hair, the points of her heels. Despite her sharp edges, she wears the warmest smile.

“Hello,” he replies, at a loss of what else there is to say to another stranger in his head. He does not ask how she knows his name. Some things are better left unspoken.

“Quynh.”

“Quynh. That is a lovely name.” A lovely name for a lovely woman. Her aura is warm and strong like Yusuf’s, yet entirely different. He wonders if they know each other as well. Which begs the questions, “Why are you here, Quynh?”

“Not sure. I suppose I needed somewhere to clear my head. A church isn’t what I had in mind, but beggars cannot be choosers.” She shrugs and climbs into the pew next to Nicolo. She pulls down the kneeler attached to the back of the pew and gets to her knees. She fidgets with the hem of her dress, shifts her weight from knee to knee, uncomfortable, but not because of the judgement from above. She speaks not to God, but to Nicolo directly. “I have started down a rabbit hole and I am afraid there is no climbing out.”

Nicolo looks around. This would be a conversation better suited for the confessional. He is alone…mostly. A few brothers linger towards the organ, out of ear shot. Should they look over, they would see him hosting a conversation all on his own. Nicolo already has a reputation for being strange. What harm was talking to himself adding to the mix? 

“I hope you find clarity here. I have been chasing it myself for quite some time.”

“Chasing, but not finding?”

“Clarity is elusive, at least for me. But, I have faith that God will put me on the right path.”

“I don’t believe in God, not that way. I believe we make our own paths.”

A smile toys at the corners of Nicolo’s mouth. “You are the second person to tell me that.”

“And the first?”

“A man who holds no faith but believes in miracles.” Nicolo shakes his head, full of curiosity and wonder. “I find myself thinking more and more of him recently. The way he talks, the way he thinks…he fascinates me.”

“I look forward to meeting him. I’m sure it is only a matter of time.” Quynh’s smile is soft and small, like she beholds some secret joke Nicolo is not privy to. Her eyes return to the crucifix, dark and intent. “Tell me, when you talk to God, what do you say when you ask for clarity?”

“I’ve never had to think about it. Mostly for guidance, for a sign that I am where I am supposed to be.” Nicky looks down at his hands clasped in prayer, how tightly the skin pulls over his knuckles. He always tries to make up a lack of words with earnest. “I never was good at waxing poetics. Maybe I am bad at asking. Maybe that is why God has yet to answer.”

“Maybe you’re just a bad priest.”

Her wit is dry and unexpected. Nicolo laughs, smile so wide it splits his face.Quynh laughs as well, quiet even though no one can hear her.

“Maybe.”

She tilts her head, studying him closely. This must be part of what she does for a living to master the ability of peeling people apart with so much as a glance.

“Why are you here, Nicolo?”

“I made myself a promise a long time ago. To be true to my heart, I must keep it.”

He touches the cross around his neck, runs his fingers over metal and wood, over cracks and divots from years of wear. It is the only belonging he brought with him to the monastery. His anchor.

“You have a strong heart. A good heart.” Quynh places a hand over where it beats a bit faster in his chest. “But it does not reside with God.”

There is no judgement there, but Nicolo feels judgement all the same. Judgement from above. He knows what Quynh says is true. It is true, because her thoughts and feelings are his thoughts and feelings. There is no denying his doubts, not from her.

“Where is your heart, Nicolo?” thump. thump. thump.“Where did it go?”

…

Yusuf rises before dawn, as he has every day this past week.

It becomes an annoying habit not of his own making. The only up side to his body’s betrayal is sharing coffee with his American friend, Nile. She took his offer of “any time” literally, popping up every morning (night, for her) for a cup and some stories.

He waits by the table, scribbling mindless shapes into the paper of his sketchpad. The priest remains his most featured muse, but Nile grows an increasing number of portraits to her collection. Sometimes Nile speaks of others: a tone-deaf French man with a temper and a woman covered in blood and bullets. Despite their explosive traits, he cannot wait until he has the pleasure of sketching them too.

Time slips by. The sun rises in the east. By the time Yusuf raises his head from his pad, light streams through the open window, and Nile stands in his kitchen with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders.

“Ah, coffee time?”

“No, not tonight.”

He gets up and follows Nile as she walks around the corner, into a room that is not his own but hers. It is nighttime here, the dark room illuminated by the glow of a flat-screen TV. She has made a home here: blankets and pillows in a nest-like pile near the center of the sofa, a large bowl of popcorn on the coffee table. Her former company sleeps soundly on the loveseat, wrapped up in each other and their own cocoon of blankets.

Nile sits on the sofa and pats the spot next to her. Yusuf goes without complaint, letting himself sink into the plush of the cushions.

Movie night is much better than coffee.

“What are we watching?” he asks.

“Hallmark movies.”

Yusuf snorts, loudly. He has never seen one, but their reputation precedes them.

“Hey, don’t judge me. They may be corny and predictable and filled with terrible acting, but I like that there is always a happy ending. No matter what, things always turn out alright.” Nile nods towards the screen, drawing his attention to the blonde woman handing out fliers to unwilling passerbys. “Like in this one, she’s an Army Captain and she’s trying to reunite with her service dog for the holidays. Right now, she’s petitioning the town hall because they’re saying it’s impossible, but she’ll find a way pretty soon.”

Nile munches on popcorn, absorbed in what is happening on screen. Yusuf cannot find it as engaging, no matter how hard he tries.

“Army Captain, huh? That must strike a few chords.”

“Not really a dog person.”

Nile’s voice is objective, removed, but Yusuf is good at reading between the lines. He sees the way she tenses, the way she won’t look directly at him when she talks.

“I used to love James Bond movies as a kid,” he says without preamble. Yusuf does not know why he chooses to share this story, but it is too late. The words are loose. No going back. “My brother and I would spend hours playing. He would be Bond, I would be Blofeld, and he would always, always beat me. I would get so mad because for once, I wanted to be James Bond. I wanted to win.”

Nile looks at Yusuf now, giving him her full attention. Maybe it is the resignation in his voice that gives him away, maybe it is their shared feelings of ancient pain, but tears stand in Nile’s eyes as she prepares herself for what inevitably comes next.

“Then, 9/11 happened and my brother got caught up in the war. Not because he chose it, not like you. It just happened. He spent his whole life playing Bond, you see, but to the people firing, he was Blofeld. He never learned that the bad guys always lose in the end.”

_People that look like him always lose in the end._

They sit in silence as she processes, breathes. Inhale. Exhale.

Inhale.

“Do you still watch them, the James Bond movies?”

“I catch the new ones when they hit theaters. But not the old ones, nah. I already know how those end.”

_Spoiler alert: movies always end better than real life._

Nile faces the screen again. She deliberates, furrows creasing her brow.

“I watch Hallmark movies because they make me feel safe. And they don’t trigger anything.” Nile swallows as she assures herself, “They’re safe.”

“I get that.”

Yusuf can appreciate the necessity of safety, makes him assess their current situation with new eyes. He is grateful Nile trusts him so close to her safe space.

He looks to where the two other women are curled up on the loveseat, fast asleep. They paint an adorable picture of comfort and domesticity.

“All three of you serve?”

“Yeah. South Side of Chicago, like most of America, isn’t really set up to let poor kids of color thrive. A lot of us saw the military as a way out.” Nile huffs and rolls her eyes. “What a joke.”

“Do you regret it?”

“Despite all the violence and the bullshit, it brought me them. Can’t regret that.”

Nile smiles at her girls with unbearable fondness. Yusuf averts his eyes. He lets them have their moment.

“Popcorn?” Nile asks, handing over the bowl.

“You read my mind, _habibti_.”

Nile buries herself into Yusuf’s side, her head in his lap. Yusuf pays little mind to the movie, favoring running soothing circles down her back instead.

Safe.

…

Andy is three fingers deep into her third vodka at some shitty hole in the wall in some shitty third world country when a glass of whiskey slams into her periphery, amber liquid sloshing over the rim.

“Looks like we had the same idea.”

The voice belongs to a man - _approaching middle aged, French, widowed, alcoholic_ \- with a kind enough smile.

“Yeah, well, misery loves company.”

He gestures to the chair across from her. Andy nods and he takes it, leaning back in the seat the way all men do when they try too hard to act casual. So, she kicks her boots up on the table like she owns the place, a silent challenge.

“Booker,” he says, ignoring her feet altogether

“Andy.”

She offers no more information, favoring her drink over conversation. There’s no rush to start speaking. Andy appreciates that. So far, she likes Booker infinitely better than the others.

“So,” she says after twenty minutes of blissful silence. “Are we gonna talk about it?”

They have an idea of what ‘it’ is: the reason they sought each other. Booker’s been fidgeting with his leather jacket since he plopped his ass in her bar. There’s something he wants, something she needs to hear.

“I met someone, another one of us. Except he’s not connected like we are. Apparently people like us are grouped into these things called clusters, all born at the same time so we share everything.”

“So Copley is like us, but he’s not cluster.”

“That’s what I gather. He knew the man who made us though: someone named Lykon. They used to work together.”

“Is that how he found us?”

“I don’t know. He wasn’t too clear on the details.”

He sticks his hand into his jacket pocket and pulls out a vial filled with little black pills.

“Copley gave me these. Called them blockers. They’re supposed to cut off our connection.”

“He just showed up at your house and gave you random unmarked pills and you took them?”

“I thought it would be best to play along. Whatever these are, they could be useful.”

Andy huffs and takes a single capsule from the vial. She holds like it a viper, waiting for the poison strike. “Do you trust him?”

“Not sure yet.” Booker pockets the pills. A cursory glance around the room lets him know no prying eyes are watching. “I was going to have Quynh take a look at them.”

“Quynh?”

Andy’s not sure why she’s shocked that Booker knows Quynh. After all, they are just as connected, part of the same cluster. It makes sense that Andy does not have Quynh all to herself. Andy never has. So why does that knot her stomach and set her at unease?

“Yeah, she’s gathering some research, trying to figure out what’s happening to us.”

Andy’s eyes narrow. “Quynh’s doing research?”

“You don’t sound too pleased.”

“It’s dangerous, sticking her neck out there like that. She’ll get us noticed, put a target on her back, and ours.”

“I set her up with a secure browser. No one’s gonna be looking for her if they don’t know she’s there.” Then Booker mutters, just to himself, “Hell of a lot better than Internet Explorer.”

Andy’s brow arches, glass half way to her lips.

“Don’t look so shocked.” Booker snorts and drinks, only to find he’s dry. “You’ve got your methods, I’ve got mine.”

“This is messy. I don’t like messy.” Andy doesn’t like being trailed, being watched and hunted. She’s felt eyes on her back ever since the Sudan Op. She wants it to stop. “Every bone in my body is telling me to go underground and ride this thing out.”

“But you’re not gonna do that, are you?”

“I’m not even sure that’s possible anymore. Not with five other people in my head.” The vodka is bitter on her tongue, tainted by the metal of the glass. It tastes too much like blood. “This world is changing, I see it becoming more sinister every day. Who’s to say Copley, the BPO, and Merrick don’t just want us for their own means?”

“I don’t know.” Booker shakes his head, carding fingers through greasy strands of blond. “All I do is sell books. You’re the woman with the gun and the plan. So, where do we go from here, Boss?”

…

Another late night.

Quynh cracks her knuckles, joints aching from how long she has stared at the computer screen. Booker’s security measures may keep her invisible, but they also take longer to get anything done. She understands the necessity for anonymity, but her patience wears thinner and thinner.

All her prayers for clarity go unanswered.

Her office is dark, the lamp in the corner lighting her desk and little else. Quynh has never been afraid of the dark. She does not foresee that changing any time soon, no matter who may be after her and her invisible friends.

What she does fear are strange noises. Strange noises currently coming from the shadows near the door.

Quynh has enough experience with this by now to know she is not alone.

“Hello Andromache.” It is a guess, but an accurate one. The woman in question steps into the light, casting drastic shadows across her pale face. She does not move with a limp, or wince in pain with every breath as before.“How is your shoulder?”

“Better. Thank you.”

She slinks into the chair across from Quynh’s desk, the uncomfortable one meant for clients so that they take up as little time as necessary. Andy makes herself at home, crossing one leg over the other. Thankfully she does not put her disgusting boots up on Quynh’s desk. It would be a shame to have to kill her.

“Thank me by not getting stabbed. Or shot. Or injured in any way.” Andy does not look pleased to be scolded. It is likely she has not had to hold herself to anyone in a very long time. “I can feel when you ache. It’s dull and cramping and not conducive to my work.”

Shame, the barest glimpse of it, crosses Andy’s face.

“I’m sorry to be such an inconvenience.”

“And now you are being an inconvenient ass.” Quynh will accept an apology from Andromache when there is more sincerity to it than bitterness. “Is there anything you need from me?”

“No.”

“Then why are you here?”

“I guess I wanted to see you. Make sure you still had a job.”

Andy fidgets in her seat. For someone as stoic and careful as she, it is a strange change of character. Perhaps, Andy even means what she says.

“I’m still surprised you care.”

Andy’s lips quirk at the corners. She rolls her eyes. “I also ran into Booker. He says you’ve been doing some research.”

Ah, there it is. The warrior fears for the poor scientist’s wellbeing. Fears that she cannot take care of herself. How cliché.

“Yes. A small collection of random bits of information, but growing slowly. Have you anything to contribute.”

Quynh cannot help the defensive tone nor the way her spine straightens to make herself taller than the woman slumped in the chair across from her. Andy is not unobservant. She notices the peacocking, lets Quynh have her moment. Quynh does not know whether to be appreciative or annoyed.

“Booker filled me in on some interesting facts. He’s got a source - a man named Copley. Think you can do anything with that?”

This is…unexpected. Quynh was sure Andy’s next words would be those of cease and desist. Now, she wants to help Quynh?

“Do you have a first name?” Quynh asks, focusing on her computer. At least that makes mildly more sense.

Andy shakes her head in the negative. Quynh frowns. “Do you have anything?”

Andy sighs, put out. “Booker’s intelligence may end at computers.”

“Alright then.” Quynh cracks her knuckles. Time to get to work. “Tell me everything.”

…

It’s half past three when Nile wakes up from her nap on the couch. Her neck aches from lying at such an odd angle. It cracks when she sits up, a pop of released pressure that feels almost as good as an orgasm.

Loveseat is empty. Jay and Dizzy must have gone to bed. They didn’t want to disturb her.They also left her with the empty wine glasses and greasy bowl of half-eaten popcorn. Who said romance was dead?

Nile carries herself and the dishes to the kitchen. When she goes to throw the remained of the stale popcorn out, the trash is full. Because of course it is.

She empties the bin and ties off the full bag before putting a new bag in. Down to the curb it is.

Outside, the California air is muggy and hot. Streetlights flicker above her, flies buzzing around the glow. Thankfully the driveway isn’t too long. 

Nile opens her mailbox while she’s at it.

Bills. Junk. Bills. Invitation to her brother’s wedding. Bills. More bills.

And a bubble-packed manilla envelope from and unmarked sender. The only identification is “Nile Freeman” written in plain block script on the front. Usually Nile throws this kind of stuff away. But this time…this time she is intrigued.

The envelope tears easily, contents emptied to reveal a single unmarked vial of black capsules.

Drugs? Someone sent her drugs?

Is this some kind of joke?

Nile pockets the vial to flush down the toilet when she gets inside. The rest of the junk can go into the garbage.

She turns to go inside and stops.

Knife. Pointed right at her. The man holding it doesn’t know what he’s doing, shifting from foot to foot, fidgeting. He’s nervous. That makes him dangerous.

Nile holds her hands up in the air. This is the kind of shit she moved away from Chicago to avoid.

“Hey man, I don’t have any money.”

He doesn’t like that answer. “Pockets!”

A few receipts and popcorn crumbs. And the pills. She offers them without hesitation.

Sirens wails in the distance. Wild eyes dart around. The knife flexes.

Panic.

“Just get out of here man!” Nile yells. She needs him gone. She needs him -

The pills. He pulls on her wrist. She pulls back. A reflex, that’s it.

Steel flashes. Heat erupts from her neck. Copper floods her mouth. Hands fly up to her throat. She tries to scream, to do anything. She can't.

As she stumbles, trips, falls, she sees the man run away.

The trash can tips over, catches her fall, hits a car. Alarms blare. Lights flicker on in the house.

Nile can’t call for help. She can’t call for help. She can’t -

“Nile!” Jay screams, or maybe it is Dizzy. It’s hard to hear over the rush of blood in her ears. The rush of blood _everywhere_.

Hands at her throat. Stinging. Burning. Holding her together.

“Jesus, Nile!” Jay/Dizzy keeps saying her name over and over. “Call 911!”

The world goes fuzzy. All Nile can see is the vial spilled across the pavement, tiny capsules rolling, rolling, gone down the storm drain.

The world goes black.


	4. shoot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took so long. My computer deleted the original version as I was adding the finishing touches. I didn't make a backup, so I had to start over from scratch.

Nile misses their coffee date.

This does not worry Yusuf. He has spent his morning routine alone his whole life. It will not kill him to return to status quo. Besides, Nile is a grown woman with many responsibilities. There are far more important things with which to occupy her time than an imaginary cup of coffee with the man who lives in her head.

Then, Nile misses the next night. And the night after that.

Now, Yusuf worries.

Reaching her is difficult. Like wading through mud, murky and thick. Nothing feels right. All of Nile’s usual warmth is gone, replaced with a cold, yawning chasm.

When Yusuf emerges, the other side looks a hell of a lot like a hospital.

Nile lies on a bed in the center of the room, quiet and still Yusuf cannot pretend she sleeps. Even in sleep, Nile twitches and murmurs. Yusuf likes to make stories from the nonsense she spouts in her sleep. There are no stories here. At least, not from Nile.

The man and woman by Nile’s bedside weave their own tale, unaware of Yusuf’s presence.

“Get the blockers to Quynh. Talk to Copley,” the woman orders in the way a captain might order a cadet. The man nods, head bowed. He turns to leave, but the woman stops him. “And Book?”

“Yeah, Boss?”

“ _Hurry_.”

Another nod from the man, and he is gone.

The woman closes her eyes, pinches her brow. Yusuf can feel her weariness become his own, dragging his bones down with the weight of a thousand years.

“Damn it kid, what have you done?”

“Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.”

Yusuf rethinks his decision to speak when the woman turns on him, hand half way down the back of her pants where he knows she keeps her gun. She will use it on him too. She will not hesitate. It should scare him, but this newfound connection has gifted Yusuf bravery in spades.

“What?”

“Isaac Asimov,” Yusuf says, as if that explains anything. “And what I mean is that whoever did this to Nile is a coward. That, or they’re the world’s most incompetent assassin.”

He side-steps her to get to the bed. No bullets find their way into the back of his skull as he sits beside Nile, so he must pass whatever test this woman deems necessary.

Sure enough, when Yusuf looks up, the gun is snugly fitted to its holster hidden beneath a ratty tank top. The woman keeps her eyes trained on him, hard and cold.

“Who are you,” she demands. Her voice is a bark, no gentleness in her tone.

“Yusuf.”

He offers his hand.

“Andy.” She takes it. Her grip is hard and tight, just like her voice. When she lets go, his knuckles throb, but he makes no move to wring his hand. She jerks her head to the bed. “So, you think that someone did this to her on purpose?”

“Don’t you think the same thing?”

“Yeah, but it’s my job to be suspicious.” She removes her sunglasses as she sits. Without them, she looks vulnerable, human. Between the dark circles staining her under eyes and the terse set of her jaw, Yusuf wonders when she last got a proper night’s sleep. “Wouldn’t expect it from someone like you.”

“Someone like me?”

It is hard to keep confrontation from his tone when faced with those three little words.

“Someone soft.”

Yusuf has heard many things follow that statement, but never soft. He does not like it, not when it comes from her mouth. It sounds like a curse.

“I’ve been called many things, but soft is a new one.”

“That’s what you are. You’re _new_. You’ve never even seen violence, not like me, not like Nile. That makes you a risk. Both you and Quynh are risks. Just two more innocents I have to protect.”

_And Nicolo._ Yusuf keeps that to himself. He does not want to share Nicolo, not with this woman who so clearly thinks of people in expendable terms.

Yusuf grits his teeth. He does not like being treated as the damsel in distress.

“Booker has no experience with violence, yet you expect it from him.”

“Booker’s hardly a boy scout. He’s been neck deep in this shit before. You haven’t. If you go digging down this hole, it’ll only put us all at risk.” Andy jabs a finger his way, threatening in a way that promises follow-through if he pushes. “If you care about Nile, you’ll stay out of this, Joe. That’s an order.”

Yusuf doesn’t like taking orders almost as much as he doesn’t like his new nick name.

He doesn’t get to protest either before Andy gets up from her chair and leaves him alone with Nile and the drone of the tele monitor.

…

Hurry is not in Booker’s vocabulary.

He spends the rest of his morning in the bookshop and sells four overpriced novels to unsuspecting tourists along with two first editions, doesn’t snap at the hipsters, and starts a ticket for a promising collection of rare Russian poetry. A pretty good day, if he does say so himself.

So, if he shows up to Quynh’s office after dark and half-drunk, fuck it. What Andy doesn’t know can’t hurt her.

No matter how many times he does this, it still unsettles him. How he can open a door and see an entirely different skyline. Hong Kong is all sharp lines and industrial angles. He hates how unwelcoming it feels. He longs for the comfort of a city well-worn.

Hopefully this meeting will be quick and he can pass out on his mattress within the hour.

“Booker,” Quynh greets. He does not know if she is happy to see him. “You better have brought cigarettes.”

On cue, he pulls the pack from his jacket pocket. He expects this, so comes prepared with lighter and all. Quynh’s face goes blissful upon inhale, sweet smoke curling into clouds between them.

“Tastes good to break the rules.” Her smile is sharp enough to cut class, and dangerous enough to know she’d use that glass to gut him. “So, tell me why you’re here. As much as I love that handsome face, I doubt this is a social call.”

He laughs, forgets how nice it is to flirt, even if it doesn’t mean anything. It’s been a while since he’s interacted with anyone outside of a business transaction. Even talking to Andy feels like taking orders. Quynh is different. Not soft, not easy, but different.

The chair across from her desk is empty. Seems like the natural place to kick up one’s feet. So he does. Then, he pulls the vial of blockers from his leather jacket.

“The cluster needs you to analyze these.”

He pushes them across the desk. Quynh stops them before they topple over the edge. It still throws Booker that she can touch a vial half way across the world.

“The cluster?”

Her eyebrow quirks. She can see straight through him.

“Me. And Andy.”

“Ah, I see.” Another smirk. Andy’s gonna kill him. “I will need the physical capsules to do any kind of analysis.”

“I’ve already sent them.” She fixes him with a questioning look. Now it is his turn to be smug. “I got your address off your computer during the upgrades.”

“Clever boy.” Was that… _approval_? “Where did you learn to do something like that?”

“Let’s just say I didn’t always sell books.”

“Hmmm looks like we are quite the little band of criminals.”

“Reformed criminal,” he corrects. It’s important that life is behind him, and that it stays behind him. “At least, until I started running with you all.”

“The cluster thanks you for your sacrifice.”

Silence spreads between them. All flirtatious pretenses slip away.

“Copley gave you these blockers.” There it is, that wicked sharp look, a viper ready to strike. “Can we trust him?”

Booker shifts his gaze over Quynh’s shoulder where the man in question listens to their entire conversation, a finger placed to his lips.

_Shhhhh._

Booker looks Quynh in the eye. “Yes.”

…

_One, two, punch. One, two, punch._

Andy’s knuckles throb, skin split and bruised. She should use a punching bag, her travel pack, anything other than the metal walls, really. Beggars can’t be choosers. She has too much restless energy to spend and too many hours left on this train to waste them standing still.

Worse is to spend her time in Nile’s room.

Andy hates hospitals as much if not more than active war zones. It’s the reason she has so many scars, the reason she’ll collect many more before she finally kicks the bucket. Hospitals tie her down, put her in the public eye, collect her information then say they won’t sell it but Andy never buys that bullshit. Everything has a price, even medical records.

Nothing good ever comes from a hospital. Nile’s learning that the hard way.

_One, two, punch. One, two, punch._

Something cracks, shifts. Andy curses. Dislocated thumb. Easy enough to pop back into place, but doesn’t make it hurt any less.

Nile’s got the good stuff running through her IV, some plastic bag with three triangles on the top right corner. Merrick Pharmaceuticals. Andy recognizes the insignia from her last stint in a Sudanese clinic. They’d given her a shot of something strong enough to sedate a horse while they fixed the stitches in her shoulder. Powerful stuff. Expensive. And that was the black-market/watered-down/charity version.

Military must have one hell of an insurance plan.

Andy flops into the visitor’s chair and admits defeat. She won’t be of any use to anyone if she breaks her hand.

People file in and out of Nile’s room with no rhyme or reason. Some take vitals, some make sure she still sleeps, and others come for no reason at all. Their faces blend together, unimportant.

That is, until, the woman with the white coat walks in.

Andy dislikes her immediately. Dislikes her prim and proper posture, her tight bun, her permanent scowl. Every red flag and alarm in Andy’s mind goes off before the woman even opens her mouth.

Because the doctor wears a badge. On that badge are three triangles in the same pattern as the bag of fluids.

Funny. Andy didn’t think pharmaceutical companies kept neurosurgeons on payroll.

A phone rings. The doctor pulls out her cellphone and accepts the call.

“You were right.” She speaks with an accent Andy can’t place, something harsh and unwelcoming. “I am with her now. How would you like me to proceed?”

The other voice is lost between the static and Nile’s distance from the door. For all the benefits of this connection, it could be annoyingly limited. What Andy wouldn’t give for a comm.

More words are exchanged. Andy can’t pick up on much other than whatever the doctor is discussing has her animated in a way that sends shivers down Andy’s spine.

“We continue as planned,” the doctor announces to her nurse upon hanging up the phone. “Book me an OR suite. The sooner the better.”

“What should I tell the coordinator?”

“Emergency craniotomy. That should light a fire under them.”

The pair leave, making their surgical preparations.

Andy’s not a doctor, but that does not sound good. Not good at all. And Andy’s got a sinking feeling that this doc is gonna cut Nile open whether she gets consent or not.

“Come on, kid,” Andy says and wills Nile to listen this time. “Wake up.”

…

The meeting with Booker leaves an unpleasant taste in Quynh’s mouth, and it isn’t the shitty cigarettes he smokes. Booker says that they can trust Copley. Quynh is unsure if she should trust Booker.

The one person she can trust stands across the plaza amongst a group of children. He kicks a ball in their direction, uncoordinated and off-target. It does not matter. The children shriek with joy. The game continues. And Nicolo moves on.

She waits by the low wall, hip resting against stones that will remain long after she is gone.

“Hello, Nicolo.”

“Hello, Quynh.”

He is surprised to see her but refuses to say it, always so intent on being kind. It amuses Quynh almost as much as it puzzles her.

“Strange to see you outside the monastery.”

“Despite popular belief, I am not a prisoner.”

Quynh huffs a laugh, rolls her eyes.

“Cigarette?”

“No, thank you. I do not smoke.”

_More for me_ , she thinks as she pulls the silver tin out of her breast pocket. None of that manufactured shit this time. Only the good stuff. She lights the cigarette and lets the flavor of hand-rolled tobacco wash over her tongue. But the other taste lingers.

“I cannot get the taste out of my mouth,” she says, frustrated.

“Tobacco?”

“Blood.”

She woke this morning to the feeling of certain death and an inability to breathe. By the way Nicolo rubs at his throat, she guesses his dreams are similar. Not the kind of conversation to have around children.

Quynh jerks her head in the direction of the match.

“You are good with them.”

Nicolo smiles, whisper-thin. “I remember what it was like to be a young boy and have very little.”

“Have you ever thought about having children?”

“My commitment to the church makes such things impossible.”

A rehearsed answer. A diplomatic answer. Not a Nicolo answer.

“But have you thought about it?”

They both watch the match a while longer. A boy falls, skins his knee, but keeps playing. The resilience of children is admirable yet exhausting.

Over the years, Quynh has witnessed family and friends marry, make homes, start families. As a woman falling outside her golden years, the pressure to have children of her own grows. Everyone at the office, family members, strangers in shop queues, ask her when she will finally experience the joy of motherhood. The answer has always been a diplomatic ‘when the time is right’. Now, with all the sensate insanity, the time may never be right.

_All for the better,_ she thinks.

“No.” Nicolo’s tone suggests a finality to the conversation. Fine by Quynh. They have more relevant things to talk about. “Have you found any clarity since we last spoke?”

“Some. I found a way to discover how our brain chemistry works, how to modify it, how to block it.” They take a few steps, admire the view. Genoa is a truly beautiful place. Thank God someone in her cluster lives somewhere free from squalor and gunfire. “I found out some interesting things about you.”

Nicolo trips over a stone, catches himself both physically and verbally.

“Oh?”

So impassive, unbothered, even when Quynh can see his jaw tick, the pulse in his neck jump. Everything about Nicolo is deliberate, from the ease of his stance to the inflection in his voice. A lion dulling his teeth and sheathing his claws.

“It is only natural to be curious about the strangers taking up space in your head. We all have a past, Nicolo. It does not define who we are.”

He snorts, looks away. “Spoken as someone who must hold no regret.”

Quynh sighs. For someone so grounded, Nicolo cannot fathom the idea of not being the only tortured person in the world.

_Should I tell him?_ she asks herself. _Might as well._

“When I was little, I had a koi pond. I would go out every morning and feed the fish, watch them swim. I envied the way they moved, wanted to be like them. So, one day, I decided to tie rocks around my ankles and jump in the deep end. I wanted to swim, you see, but I wanted to be the best. As my father always said, there is no point in doing something unless you are the best. He was a harsh man, my father. A distant man with many ideas of what a young girl should and should not be. He disapproved of nearly everything I did: archery, horseback riding, fighting. I thought swimming would be safe. I thought, if I could become as strong and as graceful as a koi fish, he would finally approve of me.”

A fantasy. She knows, all these years later. Too late.

“But I miscalculated. The stones were too heavy. I started to drown. Right before I went under, I screamed his name. I screamed for help. When I woke, I was lying on his lap, soaking wet and cold. We both were. See, he had jumped in the pond with his suit on, shoes and all. What a funny sight. I remember laughing between retches of water. My father kept me by his side the rest of day, and I thought, maybe things would finally be different. But the next morning, when I went to feed the koi fish, they were gone. My father had drained the pond and filled it with dirt. I cried and cried and cried, but my father never saw a tear. He had already left for Shanghai.”

_And that was the last time I saw him before his plane crashed in the countryside_ , goes unspoken. No need to make two tragic stories out of one.

“I do not regret what I did. But I regret calling for my father. I regret it for the fish. I loved those fish.”

She takes a drag of her cigarette.

Inhale.

Exhale.

“You and I are so similar, Nicolo. We have both been alone for so long. We do not need anyone for anything. And now, to have these strangers depend on us so heavily…it can be _unbearable_.” Quynh pinches the bridge of her nose, the faces of Andromache and Booker swirling to the forefront of her mind. “But, perhaps, we are not meant to live our lives in a fishbowl.”

“People are not fish,” Nicolo argues, staring at his hands. “And even if they were, why would they want to depend on me? I have not even met most of the cluster.”

“And why is that?”

He reminds her so much of the koi fish, swimming round and round in their pond, their gilded cage. She can see how Nicolo itches to return to his.

“To make connections is human. It is part of what makes us alive. It is not a sin to be alive, Nicolo.” She wonders if anyone has ever told him that before.The sheer confusion on his face speaks volumes. “Do you know what makes me feel alive?”

He shakes his head, and she raises her cigarette.

“When I smoke, my lungs burn. When I’m burning, it feels like I’m drowning. And I have never felt more alive than when I was drowning.”

The jackhammer of her heart, the fire in her lungs, the surge and seize of her muscles. Yes, how glorious it feels to be alive.

Nicolo’s smile is wry and desperate. Perhaps she has shaken his world view enough for one day. “Is this your way of suggesting I pick up a nicotine habit?”

“No. This is my way of asking how far will you go? Because if you stay with us, then there will come a time you will have to jump into the deep end with stones around your ankles. And I need you to swim, Nicolo.” Her eyes bore holes into his. There can be no miscommunication. He must understand. “I need you to live.”

…

Nile wakes to screaming. Screaming and the taste of blood.

Her blood.

So much blood she chokes on it. Drowns in it. Fills her nose with the scent of sea salt and her tongue with ash.

  
Wait. That’s not right.

Her gag reflex kicks in. She’s going to vomit. She’s going to vomit right now. The last thing she wants is to go down choking on both blood and bile.

It takes everything in her to sit up, to throw her body to the side, and heave whatever little is in her stomach in the pan on the ground.

Hands soothe her, comb through her hair, rub circles into her back. Warm hands. Strong hands. Nile knows that touch, but cannot place it. Not while her head pounds in her skull as it fights the fog and dehydration.

The tile, now speckled with dots of red and green and all the colors in between, is unfamiliar. These sheets, rough with starch and bleach, are unfamiliar. The woman in scrubs barging through the door is unfamiliar.

“Good morning Miss Freeman!” The nurse is chipper. Too chipper. The nasal quality of her voice does nothing to soothe the headache raging behind Nile’s temples “How are we feeling this morning?”

“Hurts.”

Hurts is not the right word. Heavy is more like it. Everything is heavy. Her bones are made of lead and lifting a finger takes the strength needed lift a two-hundred pound bell bar.

“We started you on a morphine drip. It’s a miracle you can feel anything at all.”

“It’s a miracle she’s alive at all.”

Another voice, this one older and heavily accented. It belongs to a woman in a white coat with dishwater eyes and a shark smile.

“Hello Miss Freeman, my name is Doctor Meta Kozac. I’m the neurosurgeon who has been consulted on your case.”

“Neuro…surgeon…?” Nile doesn’t understand. She cut her throat, not hit her head. “My head…my head feels fine.” Other than the headache, that is.

“That may be, but I’m afraid what is going on in the inside is not so fine.” Dr. Kozac directs their attention to a set of images. When the board lights up, so do sections of the photo. “See this grey area here - “ Dr. Kozac points to an area that looks no different from the rest. “ - this is where your frontal lobes are expanding, invading the other spaces of your brain at a rapid rate. Such expansion can cause hallucinations, loss of consciousness, dementia, and if left untreated for too long, death.”

Hallucinations.

Does that include auditory - the ring of bullets, shitty music, the sound of Andy’s laugh? Does that include taste - strong coffee and popcorn? Does that include visual - creating entire strangers across the world, down to the hidden silver strands in their hair and the dried blood stains on their shoes?

Is any of it real? Is she losing her mind?

“What are Nile’s options?”

That voice. Nile knows that voice just as she knows the hands that soothe her. What little energy she has is used turning her head the other direction, only to come face to face with an older, prouder version of herself.

“M-mom…”

Seven years does little to dull the ache in Nile’s chest at seeing her mother again. Her brother is there, too. His are the hands at her back, running down her spine, just as she used to do to him whenever he got sick.

“The only treatment available is surgery.” Dr Kozac’s voice reminds Nile that this is not a touching family reunion. “I will need to go in and remove the excess brain matter before it overwhelms the rest of her systems.”

“No!” Nile cries. Her stitches pull, tender flesh screaming for mercy. “There…another way…”

“I’m afraid this is the only option.” There are no comforting words, no assurances that everything will be fine. Dr. Kozac stares through Nile, like she can already see Nile’s skull cracked open under her knife. “Let me know when Miss Freeman comes to a decision. I can have an operating suite cleared as early as tomorrow morning.”

Nile will be damned if she lets this mad woman anywhere near her brain.

“Jay…Dizzy…” Nile says through the pain. “Where are Jay and Dizzy?”

“Only family are allowed visitation.”

Of course Jay and Dizzy are family. They are the most important family Nile has. Why won’t they come see her?

“Can’t make…a decision…without them.”

“Nonsense.” Nile knows that tone. She has already lost. “I’m your mother. I know what’s best. Now hush and let me take care of you.”

Frustration builds along with tears. Suddenly, Nile is seventeen again, her clothes strewn on the front lawn and an ultimatum lying at her feet. Except this time she cannot ignore the consequences of staying silent.

“It’ll be okay,” her brother soothes, or at least, he tries. He does not know how to fix this. How can he say it will be okay?

As her mother and the doctor continue to talk, one thing becomes abundantly clear: she needs to get out of this hospital.

Now.

…

_Drip. Drip. Drip_.

The low-hanging ceilings leave their ancient condensation in puddles on the ground. It is dark inside the catacombs, the light of mounted torches casting eerie glares across endless lines of pillars. Most of the brothers are too superstitious to come down here, amongst the dead and decaying. Most are too scared.

Most are not Nicolo.

He finds solace in the shadows. There is less of a chance someone will look for him here.

Nicolo passes many treasures as he wanders. A crest on the wall, a pair of swords polished to perfection behind it. A sculpture of a cardinal who lived before the Renaissance began. A hospital bed.

A hospital bed.

Tucked between two pillars lies the entryway to a room: harsh white light, linoleum floors, the smell of antiseptic. In that room is a bed: starch crisp sheets, metal railings. Upon that bed is a woman: young, black, gauze wrapped tightly around her neck.

At the foot of the bed sits Yusuf: tired, curls askew, eyes closed, beautiful. He does not hear Nicolo, not at first. Nicolo is loathe to wake him, even if the sleep is not real and his eyes are simply resting.

Curiosity, however, is Nicolo’s downfall.

“Who is she?”

She must be someone important to encourage such a strong reaction. A lover, sister, friend? Jealousy is an unwelcome intruder, churning in Nicolo’s stomach as he turns through each scenario.

“Nile.” Yusuf places a kiss to the back of her hand, and Nicolo feels it as if those lips were placed to the back of his own. “She is one of us.”

One of us. One of the cluster. Nicolo steps closer to get a better look. It is hard to get any kind of impression through all the machinery.

“What happened to her?”

“That is what we are trying to find out.”

Nicolo does not have to ask who ‘we’ is. Only a few weeks with this newfound ability, and he already thinks in terms of cluster.

Yusuf rises, stretches. Nicolo tries and fails to avert his gaze. It is impossible not to stare at Yusuf, not when he smiles at Nicolo like he has hung the moon and all her stars.

“It is good to see you.” Despite the solemnity of their meeting, Yusuf’s eyes contain genuine happiness. Nicolo basks in it like a cat in the sun. Yusuf casts a glance around the crumbling state of their surroundings. “Where are you?”

“The catacombs, hidden under the monastery.” Nicolo waves the lantern so light catches on a coat of arms, illuminating the metal of the swords. “It is the sacred duty of the brothers to preserve the history here. Some of the relics date as far back as The First Crusades.”

“The Crusades?” Yusuf’s eyebrows rise until they disappear into the thick nest of black curls. He contemplates the information, looks at the ancient stones as if this changes them. “What do you think it would have been like to live all those years ago?”

“We would have been on opposite sides of the war. I would have had to kill you.”

“Ha! Only in your dreams,” Yusuf’s laugh is bright enough to chase away the dark and warm enough to burn away the damp. Perhaps he knows Nicolo’s dreams of Yusuf contain a different kind of violence. “A man like you, a man of peace, is not included to violence. I would have struck you down before you had the chance to draw your sword.”

Nicolo looks at his hands, calloused and strong and clean. It is not hard to imagine them covered in red.

“You think?”

Yusuf thinks he is a man of peace. A man of peace. _A man of peace_.

“I know. I would have killed you, and many times at that.”

Jokes. Jokes cannot harm anyone.

The only casualty is Nicolo, speared by the crinkles by Yusuf’s eyes, the white of his teeth, the lines around his mouth. Beautiful.

“It is good that we live now, and not then. I do not think I could bear to cause you pain.”

The smile disappears. Nicolo curses himself, bites the inside of his cheek so hard he tastes blood for the second time that day.

_Too far. You go too far, Nicolo._

“Nicolo, may I be honest with you?” Yusuf asks, unsure. Nicolo will grant Yusuf anything he wants so long as it returns them to status quo.

“I hope so.”

“I am…confused, about this relationship between us.”

Nicolo’s tongue lies heavy in his mouth. “Confused?”

Confusion is understandable. Confusion is Nicolo’s constant companion. Nothing makes sense to him anymore. Nothing except Yusuf. Sadness curls in his gut that he cannot provide Yusuf the same solace.

“Sometimes, when we are this close, I can blame our newfound connection. To feel things how you do, so vibrant and alive…it _overwhelms_.”

Yusuf reaches out, places a hand on Nicolo’s breast bone. Even through layers of fabric, Nicolo can feel the heat. Fingers curl over his clavicle, brush against his throat. Nicolo’s pulse trips over itself, hammering harder, faster. Nicolo wills it to slow, wills the callouses on Yusuf’s thumb too thick to notice.

How strange, Nicolo thinks, that his heart can beat so fast when his lungs have ceased to draw breath.

“But sometimes, I wonder…”

That thumb brushes over his pulse once, twice, three times.

Then Yusuf is kissing him, and Nicolo’s heart stops completely.

Gentle. Yusuf is gentle. So, so gentle with his hands, his lips, his overwhelming touch. Nicolo does not know gentle, has never had gentle. Nicolo is rough, jagged edges. He wants to warn Yusuf to be careful, to look before he cuts himself.

Nicolo wants to be gentle for Yusuf.

He wants and he wants and he _wants_.

Is it possible to die from want? With every slide of his lips, Yusuf pries want from where Nicolo has beaten it back into the deepest recesses of his soul. Nicolo wants to know how it feels to thread his fingers through Yusuf’s curls, so he does. Nicolo wants to hear the sounds Yusuf makes, tiny rumbles in the back of his throat. He wants to swallow them down, wants to draw them out over and over and over again. He wants so many things, too many things.

  
Greed has always been the deadliest of the seven sins. And gluttony has always been Nicolo’s Achilles heel.

Yusuf is just as greedy as Nicolo. Unlike Nicolo, he makes no secret of his want. He devours Nicolo, mouth sealed over his as he takes and takes and takes. His hands wander, trace idle patterns across Nicolo’s back, down the dip of his spin, over familiar lines, raised and smoothed over with time -

No.

This is wrong.

So very _wrong_.

A hand shoots out, pushes Yusuf away. Nicolo shakes with the force of his desire, the force of his failure.

“I’m sorry.”

Tears smart in his eyes. He cannot catch his breath.

How stupid he was to think he could have someone like Yusuf. Someone without scars. Someone untainted by violence. Someone good.

Nicolo will not let Yusuf cut himself on his jagged edges. He cannot bear the thought. Just as he cannot bear to look Yusuf in the eye and see the heartache there.

“I’m sorry,” he says, over and over and over again. Long after Yusuf is gone.

This is for the best.

_Don’t you know, Nicolo? You ruin everything you touch._


	5. sapling

Yusuf’s problem is that he cares too much.

He will stop to assist an elderly woman with her groceries. He will donate his last earnings to a charitable cause. He will give his meager ration of food to the man who needs it more. He will care and care and care until he bleeds himself dry.

This is his fatal weakness: he cares too much. About everything but himself.

Which is why he will not let himself feel heartache. He will not dwell on the kiss that haunts him day and night.

He will stay here, with Nile, at her bedside as she heals. Nile, bless her, does not question his presence. It helps that she sleeps. When she wakes, she cannot remember their past interactions. It has become a tedious, alarming dance. Yusuf blames the drugs.

“No…you’re not - you’re not real.”

Nile fights, this time. It is hard to predict which version Yusuf will get. He likes the fighting version. Fighting reminds him of how strong Nile is. How she will continue to fight.

“I’m real Nile.” Yusuf’s assurances are lost as they always are, but that does not stop him from saying them. “I’m as real as you. And I think these doctors know that. And I think that’s why they want to get inside your beautiful head.”

  
Wrong thing to say.

Nile panics.

“I don’t want them inside my head.”

“They’re not gonna lay a finger on you. We won’t let them.”

Yusuf keeps his touch light, soft, soothing. Nile deserves soft things.

“My mom…she signed the papers.”

Yusuf knows of no papers.

“It’s gonna be okay, Nile.”

“She doesn’t love me. My brother doesn’t love me. Jay and Dizzy don’t love me. Not enough to come get me.” Tears drip down the corner of Nile’s eyes, soaking the pillow beneath. “I don’t have a family. I don’t have anyone.”

“I know what that feels like.” An ancient hurt, a box shoved into the back of his memory, dusted with cobwebs and warning signs. He opens the box anyway. For Nile. “My mother and my brother are dead. Have been for quite some time. And my father…my father was the kind of man everyone respected. The kind of man other men aspired to be: powerful, wealthy, educated. He had the world at his fingertips; he would wave his hand, and all his problems disappeared. The one thing he could not stand was inconvenience, so I took it upon myself to be the greatest inconvenience of all. I started breaking into places, causing scenes, doing anything I could to make noise. I got arrested, spent many nights in jail. Every time, he’d wipe the slate clean, pay the cops, post my bail. I hated him for it. I hated him for making me feel like he could wave his hand and I would disappear.

“He could stand all that, my father. He could tolerate the robbery and the arson and the misconduct. But when I told him that I loved men, that I would never marry a woman, he said he’d rather have a thief for a son. He said he wished it was me who’d died instead of my brother. So I packed my things that night and disappeared. My father finally got what he wanted. I haven’t had anyone since. Not until recently.”

He takes Nile’s hand, cold and clammy, in his own. Her body shakes, fine tremors. Shakes with the fear of losing everything and everyone. He needs to make this right. He needs to make _something_ right.

“We are your family, Nile. Just as Jay and Dizzy are your family.” Yusuf squeezes her hand tight so she believes him. “You will see them again, I promise you. We will find a way.”

They do not speak, not for a while. They breathe as one, in and out. In and out.

Then, Nile’s voice, barely a whisper, “I don’t want this.”

More tears. She cannot make them stop. Yusuf knows her grief and frustration as his own.

“You are not the only one.” Booker and his drinks, Andy and her control, Nicolo and his -“But hey, I would miss you. If you were gone, who else would I get to watch cheesy movies with, or share stories, or make coffee for?”

“The man with the blue eyes. The one you keep drawing.”

There must be something in the line of his posture, the turn of his mouth, in the stutter of his fingers in their path across her skin, that gives him away. Nile’s fear is replaced with compassion.

She does not understand. Neither does Yusuf.

“Oh Yusuf…I’m sorry, I - “

“It’s not your fault, habibi. Sometimes these things…they’re not meant to be.”

Yusuf runs his fingers over Nile’s knuckles. Back and forth. Back and forth. He’s not sure which one of them he’s soothing.

“There’s nothing good in any of this.”

Nile’s voice is something pathetic and child-like. As much as she hates being called a child, Yusuf can see the resemblance. They are the same age, but she’s so _young_.

“I wouldn’t say that.” Back and forth. Back and forth. “I got a pretty amazing sister out of it.”

He tries to smile. He’s not quite sure if he succeeds or fails.

Nile’s smile is a watery thing, like her eyes.

“I wish I could hug you.” _That would be nice,_ Yusuf thinks. He could do with a hug. “I’ll be so pissed if you’re not real.”

Laughter, rough and tired. The drugs are kicking back in, enough morphine to sedate a horse. Quynh says that people of African descent metabolize opiates at a higher rate. Yusuf still doesn’t like how much they give Nile. It feels wrong.

_Not for much longer,_ he vows. _Not for much longer_.

“Sleep,” Yusuf says, running a hand through her hair.

A few breaths later, she’s gone.

…

The time for holding tongues is past.

Quynh can deal with the strange looks, the whispers in the halls, the sudden lack of fair-weather friends. What she cannot deal with is a cut work load and an email requesting a mandatory leave of absence.

Forget all Quynh has done for the company. One ‘mental breakdown’ and she is no longer the leading chemist in the R&D department.

_Fucking men_.

The email also requests her presence in the meeting room on the top floor of the building. No doubt to lecture her on the importance of image and perception. They will tell her this leave is a good thing. Like the rumors will not be enforced by her absence. Like the sharks will not circle, try to steal her job from her waters.

Rage simmers underneath Quynh’s skin. Every step she takes fuels her fire.

Booker is in her elevator.

Of course he is.

“Did you get the samples?”

This is exactly what Quynh does not need right now.

“Yes. They just arrived.”

That morning, actually. Sitting unopened in the manilla envelope on her desk. She doesn’t need to open the package to know what’s inside. There’s only one person who would send her mail from Paris.

“How long until analysis?”

The floors creep by at a glacial pace.

“This compound is completely unknown to me. I’m not even sure where to start. Add the wrong thing, run the wrong assay, and I could destroy the molecules.” Thinking about the ways this could go wrong compounds Quynh’s headache. She pinches the bridge of her nose, shakes her head. “This could take days. Weeks.”

Booker sighs, curses in French like he forgets Quynh can understand him. “We don’t have that kind of time.”

Rage, hot and quick, boils past its tipping point. Over the edges of her self-control. Past the filters of her lips.

“Here’s an idea. Do it yourself!”

He is lucky she slaps him with her briefcase and not slit his throat with the letter opener in the front pocket.

The doors of the elevator open. Quynh does not hesitate to leave Booker behind.

_Fucking men_.

…

_Ring. Ring. Ring._

The telephone on the table rings and rings and rings. Nile lets it scream. There’s no one out there looking for her, no one out there left to care.

Nile is alone. She’s always alone. But not really. Not between the nurses and the doctors and social workers. Not when the kind man with the beard _\- Yusuf -_ is around.

Not real, Nile reminds herself. He’s not real.

The phone, however, is real. A real goddamn nuisance.

_Ring. Ring. Ring._

She’s not supposed to answer the phone. Don’t talk to strangers, her mother always says. Her mother is real. Nile can trust her mother.

Can’t she?

Nile answers the phone, if only to shut it up. She wraps the cord around her wrists, fidgets with the loops as she waits for the other end to say whatever is so important -

“Nile!” The voice on the other end is ecstatic. Ecstatic and…sad? Nile hears sobs. They could very well be her own. “Oh my God, Nile! I can’t believe - “

“Jay?”

Nile does not dare hope. She does not hope -

“Yes, Nile. Baby. It’s me. It’s Jay. Oh my God it’s Jay, and Dizzy’s here too.” Jay…and Dizzy? The relief has Nile stumbling into the visitor’s - _Yusuf’s_ \- chair. “We have been going out of our minds worrying. Are you alright? are you okay?”

“Are you real?” She has to ask. She has to know. “Is this real? Is this in my head? Are you actually calling?”

“Of course, of course this is real baby. Of course. Why would you think that?”

Tears fall freely, coating her cheeks, puffing her eyes. She has cried so much these past days Nile is surprised she still has tears to give.

“The doctors. They say…they say there’s something w-wrong with my head. That I’m seeing things, hearing things. And I think they’re right, Jay. They’re right. I keep seeing these people, hearing things. And it feels so real - “

“Nile. Calm down baby. Whatever…whatever is going on we’ll figure it out, okay? We will get to you and we will figure it out.”

Nile believes it when Jay says it. She believes anything Jay says. She followed Jay’s orders in Afghanistan, followed her all the way home, never left. Nile can follow Jay until the world stops turning.

“They want to cut me open,” she confesses, and for the first time, entertains her fears. “They want to cut out the part that’s making me sick.”

Cursing. A lot of it.

“No one is touching that beautiful brain.” Jay sounds livid, righteously so. Nile is strangely giddy at the thought. “We are on the way. Do you hear me? Dizzy and I are on our way to you. Come hell or high water, we are getting you out of there. Tonight.”

Music to Nile’s ears. The best news.

“Hurry. I think they’re coming.”

Voices down the hall grow louder. She is alone, alone for too long. No one checks on her. That is strange. She’s overdue an invasive check up.

Any minute now, Jay and Dizzy will come crashing through those doors and save her. It’s the only thing holding her together.

“We’re coming baby, I promise.”

The door bursts open.

“I love you.”

Barely a whisper, but Jay hears it. She always hears Nile.

“We love you so much Nile. So much. And I promise - “

The line goes dead.

“Jay…” Nile’s stomach plummets. “Dizzy?”

The dial tone drones. Nile looks up.

Sees a nurse with one hand on the receiver, the other holding a wicked-sharp needle. In the doorway, a gurney waits with leather restraints. Two men stand at the helm, watching, waiting.

For her.

“Time to go, Miss Freeman.”

Too late.

…

“You and I need to talk.”

What a way to wake up.

Booker groans. Pain bursts behind his eyelids. His head pounds. That’s nothing compared to the pain promised in Andy’s eyes if he doesn’t get out of bed.

“Do you mind? That’s an original manuscript.”

Andy lifts her hand from the nightstand where it creases a stack of yellowed papers. Booker slides the precious documents away from Andy’s line of fire. He won’t get as much for it if there are bullet holes between the lines.

“I need you to break into the hospital’s security system and delete Nile fromtheir registry.”

_What?_

“I’m not sober enough for this,” Booker mutters.

He needs coffee, if for nothing other than to quiet the banging in his skull. There is no amount of caffeine large enough to process this request.

Andy follows him as he gets out of bed, throws water on his face, changes his shirt. Her patience ends as he rummages through his cupboard for something edible.

“We need to do something, Book. The longer she sits in that hospital bed, the more of a risk we are all at.”

“I know that, Andy.” Maybe he shouldn’t snap at the woman with the power to break his bones. But Booker is exhausted and stressed and really looking forward to one day without cluster insanity. He sighs, rubs at his temple, starts over. “ _I know_. You think I haven’t been trying? We are half the world away from Nile. This shit isn’t easy.”

Andy’s anger deflates. She throws her body into the empty kitchen chair. She doesn’t even prop her boots up on the table. If that doesn’t scream something’s wrong, nothing will.

“I know. _Fuck_ , I know.” She sounds just as tired and frustrated as Booker feels. Perhaps that’s why he is so miserable: it’s their misery compounded. “I’m just not used to feeling so - “

“Stressed?”

“Useless.” The word spits through clenched teeth. Booker can sympathize. “My thoughts, my decisions, they aren’t just mine anymore. I used to be so decisive. Pick a door, don’t look back, deal with the consequences. I can’t stand all this watching and waiting.”

“You’re not useless, Andy.” That’s the last word Booker would ever use to describe her. “You’re the least useless of all of us. That’s why you’re the boss.”

“Yeah, sure.” She rolls her eyes. “You’re the only one who thinks that.”

“Nile and the other one - Joe? They listen to you. Quynh marches to the beat of her own drum; she’s too proud to admit it, but she realizes you’re just trying to help.”

“ _Yeah_.”

There’s something more, something she’s not saying. Something in the way her eyes dart around his apartment, searching, restless.

“It’s not just Nile you’re worried about. It’s Quynh too.”

“I can’t reach her. Every time I try, it’s like a brick wall.” Andy balls her hands into fists. Booker worries for the state of his apartment. “Why does she have to be so goddamn frustrating?”

“Have you tried cigarettes?” Andy shoots him a strange look. Booker shrugs. “Listen. You’re two strong women stuck in a pissing contest. Just cut the crap and get to the heart of what you both want.”

Andy opens her mouth to reply. Booker’s no longer paying attention.

His attention is on the man on the sofa.

“Book? What is it?”

Andy follows his gaze, except she can’t see Copley. All she sees is empty cushions.

“Copley. He’s here.”

On cue, the man stands. He’s dressed in another ridiculously crisp suit. And he’s flustered. That’s new.

“You wanted to know if you could trust me. Here’s your chance,” Copley pauses, waits for approval. The urgency in his tone is what grants it. “One of you is in immediate danger.”

“Nile.”

A single nod. They’re out of time.

“Miss Freeman is being carted away to emergency surgery as we speak. She needs your help. Go to her. Save her.”

Booker turns.

“Andy. Nile - “

Andy is already gone.

…

A voice, familiar and booming, disturbs Nicolo from prayer.

“Here is a sight I thought I’d never see: Nicolo in the chapel, reciting his prayers.” Brother Frattaroli moves to stand before Nicolo, a smile on his face and hands folded in front of his stout belly. “A miracle indeed.”

Nicolo knows he strays, strays for far too long. Guilt eats through his stomach, through his chest, through his soul. Why must he be so weak? So without conviction? He used to have an iron will.

He used to be a lot of things.

“I thought prayer could help me find clarity, help me find my way back…” _From sin. From damnation. From the flames that lick at my heels and claw at my ankles, ready to drag me home._ “I have prayed for hours, but I fear now that God will not answer.”

Jesus weeps upon the crucifix. Nicolo is not foolish enough to think he weeps for him.

“Is this why you keep delaying your vows?”

The vows. Chastity. Poverty. Obedience. To love and serve God above all others. Simple enough rules, or so Nicolo thought. Much has changed since he first stumbled through these sacred doors. 

“I thought you were supposed to help me?”

“Really? I was not aware that lying to novitiates in order to ease their troubled conscience was part of my solemn duty.”

“Then what, exactly, is your duty?”

Brother Frattaroli laughs. His smile widens. A hand comes to rest between Nicolo’s shoulder blades, heavy but gentle. Nicolo does not deserve gentle, not after all he’s done, but it is what he gets.

Gentle reminds him of soft curls and sighs and lips. Of all the things he cannot have.

“Keep praying, Nicolo. You may yet receive the answers you seek. Just have faith.” 

Brother Frattaroli leaves him. Nicolo is alone in the chapel, as he prefers it.

Unknown hours pass as Nicolo keeps his eyes on the altar, at the cross bearing Jesus’ weight, his bones, his blood. There are no windows, here. No way to see the setting and rising of the sun.

Perhaps God will send him an angel. A messenger. A sign. Anything to tell Nicolo what he needs to do in order to return to status quo. This journey has been rocky too long, the path unclear. Nicolo may not deserve gentle, but he deserves rest.

Rest does not come. The more time he spends praying, the more exhaustion spreads. Perhaps the only message God sends is that Nicolo must sleep.

Nicolo exits the pew, kneels to cross himself, stops short.

A woman stands at the foot of the altar, head bowed, voice too low to pick out her words. No women are allowed in the monastery. She should not be here.

Neither should the terror that pours off her in waves.

Her head raises. Nicolo recognizes that face, that neck wrapped in thick white gauze.

This is no angel. This is Nile.

Dark eyes pierce his own, wide and searching.

“Help me.”

A crash. A bang. Not here, but elsewhere. At the end of the aisle. The woman runs towards it. Away from it. Nicolo watches her retreating figure, hospital gown billowing as she goes.

Nicolo has no choice.

He follows.

…

Andy lies on her back, strapped to a hospital bed by her ankles and wrists. Like she is some kind of savage.

Well, they’re not wrong.

Cuffs are easy to maneuver out of. Simple business of dislocating thumbs and popping them back into place. Andy’s done it so many times it doesn’t even hurt.

Andy stands, cracks her neck, rolls her shoulders. Everything is stiff from hours spent locked in prone position.

Nile stares at her, eyes wide. Andy cuts her a smirk.

“Happy to see me?”

Nile laughs, delirious. It’s enough for Andy.

Andy lends a hand to help Nile up. Nile is uneasy on her feet, slow to rise and sways in her step. Must be the morphine. Andy curses this institution for the millionth time.

_There is a way out_ , Andy repeats like a mantra. _You just have to get her there_.

Two steps, and the job gets harder.

“Miss Freeman!” a nurse screams, hits the panic button on the wall.

Alarms blare. Lights flash.

Out of time.

The nurse is bigger than Nile, stronger than Nile with all the drugs pumped through her system. But Nile has Andy. And Andy has rage.

A needle comes Nile’s way. Andy catches the wrist, squeezes. The nurse screams as her arms twists, breaks, bone splits skin.

The syringe falls. Andy catches it, strikes. Needle finds the fleshy skin of the nurse’s neck, jugular bulging under the added ten cc’s of fluid.

Vecuronium.

The nurse goes down hard, out before she hits the ground. Someone will find her before she chokes on her tongue. Andy doesn’t care if she lives or dies.

Nile drops the syringe, hands shaking. She’s going into shock.

They don’t have time for this.

“Let’s go!”

Andy shoves Nile, _hard_ , and tears out of the operating theater. Nile is hot on her heels. Technically she makes Nile move, their bodies one and the same. It’s still strange to think about.

They don’t make it far before the next hurdle comes.

Men with guns. Men with guns who have no problem opening fire on unarmed patients. Men with three triangles on their badges.

Andy yanks Nile back towards the theater. There has to be a way out. Preferably before they turn into swiss cheese.

Then, she sees it: fire escape.

Except the handle won’t turn. The badge scanner on the wall blinks red.

Locked.

“ _Fuck_!” Andy screams, kicks the door. Her boot does nothing. Her boot isn’t there. Nile’s toes crunch under the force. She cries out, but Andy won’t stop.

What pharmaceutical company keeps a swarm of armed guards?

“There’s too many!”

“NO!”

Andy doesn’t have time to register the other voice. Doesn’t have time to process the appearance of someone else - a priest of all things.

A priest with a gun. Where did they get a gun?

Another question that goes unanswered between the pop and ring of shots. Andy waits for impact, for the tear and sear of flesh she is uncomfortably familiar with. But it never comes.

All that comes is silence.

Silence that follows the dull thud of bodies as three guards hit the ground, perfect bullet holes in the center of each forehead.

The priest lowers the gun. His hands don’t shake. He does not falter.

Nile stares. “Who are you?”

The adrenaline high comes crashing down. The priest looks at both of them. There are no words in any language to describe the conflict within those eyes.

And then he’s gone.

There is no time to linger. No time to waste.

“Come on, kid. Move!”

Andy pushes them forward and the questions behind. So many things do not make sense, but this does. Andy can do this. She can do an extraction. They have a gun now - albeit three bullets lighter. That’ll make things easier.

No more guards wait on the stairs. No one stops them from taking the staff exit. No one stops them in the parking lot. No one stops them from entering the yellow taxi cab with two of the world’s most unlikely drivers.

Andy does not stop until Nile is safe in the backseat wrapped in Dizzy’s arms, Dizzy’s tears staining her hospital gown. Andy does not stop until Jay presses her lead foot to the gas and tears onto the interstate. Andy does not stop until she feels Nile’s heartbeat slow.

Andy does not stop until they are safe.

In the flash of the streetlights, Andy knows they are not alone. She can see Yusuf’s hands in Nile’s hair and Booker’s arms tucked under Nile’s knees and Quynh’s fingers tracing patterns into the spurs of Nile’s ankles.

They are a cluster. They are almost whole.


	6. sapwood

_Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy kingdom come, thy kingdom come..._

Kingdom come too late.

Hours spent praying, repeating the same words. Words that once brought Nicolo comfort now bring anxiety. Still, he kneels. Kneels and prays.

_Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not in to temptation but deliver us from -_

“You keep praying for absolution and you keep getting me.”

_\- Evil_. Personified as a woman with more ferocity in her veins than Nicolo possesses even on his worst days. There was a time he would have thought that impossible.

Too many things are possible now.

The woman - _Andromache, soul as old as the crust of the earth and just as unfathomable_ \- casts a glance around the dismal chapel: the leaking walls, the rough-hewn pews, the crucifix as the sole decoration. Her amusement, her discomfort, is his own. Her lips quirk in a smile.

“Does that make me God?”

What an absurd thought. He has the urge to laugh.

“If you are God, then I fear for my mortal soul.”

“Ouch.” Her voice echoes over stone arches, up to the rafters, a mockery of all that is holy. A reminder of another life left behind.

She steps before the altar, then sits on it. Just because she can.

“So, how does a priest learn to shoot like that? Those were clean kills, single bullet each. From that distance, impossible to be a lucky shot. Three in row? That speaks to experience.”

Nicolo refuses to rise to the bait. His gaze focuses on the wall beyond while his silence belies an old rage kept on a tight leash. Andy recognizes it well enough.

She holds her hands up, a sign of peace.

“Relax, I’m not here to judge you. I’m here to thank you. We’d be dead if it wasn’t for you.”

This is a woman not used to relying on others. She doesn’t like being the one to owe debts. Nicolo wants no reason to behold her to him.

Sitting on the altar must lose its appeal. She jumps down.

“You should talk to the kid. She keeps asking about the man who saved her life.”

Speak to Nile. Now there is something Nicolo did not consider. Every bone in his body riots at the idea. To return to Nile, to lead himself into temptation, will damn him. He is not who he once was. He cannot be.

And yet...

Brown eyes, scared and pleading are all he sees. Nile running, running, _gone_ down the aisle, away from the altar, towards an unknown fate. He does not know if she made it out unscathed. He tells himself he does not want to know.

Except he does. He wants to see Nile. He wants to feed the thrill that sang at the familiar grip of a gun in his hand. He wants to feed the monster in his mind, starved and feral.

He wants to damn himself.

He is weak. Pathetic. Lacking in will.

He will do better. He _must_ do better.

He is silent too long.

Andromache is gone.

Nicolo is alone under the oppressive eyes of God.

…

Churches. Andy hates churches.

The universe hates her and so it makes sense this is the second church she steps foot in that day. It is a miracle neither burns in her presence.

This church is much less lively than the last, covered in dust that filters through the air in grey clouds. This church has no parish, no minister, no place in the world. Just like her.

Perfect for hiding.

Which is why Andy is confused when she opens the rectory door to find a much more modern set-up.

The apartment is full of clean lines, white and black with gold accents. Like the office, a wall of windows lines the back. Beyond the clouds lies a perfect view of Hong Kong.

Andy takes a turn, admiring the high ceilings, intricate moldings, and expensive finishes. She’s never been in a place this nice. At least, not a place she intends to leave in one piece.

_Just how much money does Quynh make?_

“Nice place.”

“Thank you.”

Logically, Quynh has to be here. Why else would Andy be here?

That does not prepare Andy for the sight of Quynh in a red dress.

Quynh stands in the opening between the kitchen and living space, face and hair done up to match the formality of her outfit. Dark eyes and red lips promise sin and salvation. She is an angel. She is damnation.

Andy does not like how her breath catches in her throat, how her chest grows tight. Someone ties a rubber band around her ribs and pulls -

“You’re bleeding,” Quynh says, breaking the spell.

Andy shakes her head. Remembers why she’s here.

“Yeah, the stitches pulled somewhere around Afghanistan. Do you mind…?”

Quynh hums. It’s impossible to tell if she is annoyed or willing to help. Then, she cocks her head and turns down the hall. Andy follows.

They wind up in the bathroom. More clean lines. More white and black and gold. More places for Andy to tarnish.

Quynh gestures to the toilet - “Sit.” - and goes back to rummaging through cabinets.

Andy is helpless against Quynh’s orders. It’s scary, how much Andy is willing to give her.

All the rummaging is for a first aid kit.

This close, Andy can smell the florals of Quynh’s perfume, can feel the brush of fly aways against her cheek.

“All this danger, Andromache. How did you manage to take care of yourself all these years alone?”

Andy thinks of years bouncing from home to home, years without a home, years destroying other people’s homes. Years of blood and heartache and pain.

“Poorly.”

“What’s the occasion?”

“Despite my mandatory leave of absence from the company, the higher ups have requested I attend a company dinner. All of the members of the board will be there, expecting a show of our most recent developments which I directly oversee. As one of the senior research developers, I am most qualified to answer any questions the board may have.” A gentle dab of the cotton ball. A faint throb of pressure. Dark eyes focus on Andy’s skin, watch the edges push and pull together again. Whole. “They are lost without me.”

_So am I,_ Andy thinks. She banishes the thought as soon as it springs so that its tendrils do not take root.

Andy needs no one and nothing.

“I do not think Booker is trustworthy,” Quynh says.

_ What?  _

“Hell of a non-sequitur.”

Quynh does not apologize. Andy does not expect her to. It does not stop the irrational annoyance from flaring. 

“I’m not getting in the middle of your lover’s spat.”

_“Lover’s spat?”_

Quynh’s shrill tone would be adorable if Andy did not choose to feed anger instead.

“First it’s ‘Booker can fix my computer’ and ‘Booker brought me blockers’ and now it’s ‘he’s not trustworthy’?” Aggression is not needed, but Andy cannot resist. Not when her bones itch for a fight at the very thought of Booker’s hands on Quynh’s skin. “Whatever it is, whatever he did to offend you - called you a name, bought the wrong kind of cigarettes, whatever. I’m not getting in it.”

Quynh’s cheeks are as red as her dress, her eyes blackened storm clouds. She steps forward, into Andy’s space. Her aura threatens violence. Andy has not felt fear like this in so long, long enough to forget how much it thrills -

Red lips meet Andy’s chapped ones. Andy’s stomach dips.

Quynh is not kind. She is demanding. Rough. She pushes until Andy has no choice but to break. And oh, how easily Andy shatters under Quynh’s assault. Years of building walls and all it takes is the touch of Quynh’s lips to bring everything crumbling down.

Teeth nip and bite and pull. Tongues soothe. Lipstick smears across Andy’s lips, cheeks, down the line of her jaw, her throat. Red as blood. A different kind of violence.

Quynh pulls away, angrier than before.

“Why are you so _frustrating_?” Quynh growls.

Something in Andy’s gut twists and _wants_.

“Sorry,” Andy breathes, waits a beat, and dives back in.

Fingers tighten at the base of Andy’s skull. There will be marks come morning. Nails dig into skin, sting. Too close to pain to be pleasure, and yet -

_Masochist_ , Andy tells herself. She can’t bring herself to care. Quynh can’t hurt her in any way that matters.

Quynh pulls away again. The anger is gone. The storm ebbs away, but the air around them stays heavy.

“We cannot trust Booker.”

“Okay.”

Quynh frowns, hisses. “ _You aren’t listening_.”

“I have no reason not to trust him. He’s proved himself to be an asset. But as a general rule, I never trust anyone more than I trust myself. I’ll keep an eye on him.”

This appeases Quynh, if only marginally. She nods, lips set in a firm line. “That is all I ask.”

Whatever is left unsaid remains unsaid. The chime of a phone destroys any lingering possibility of conversation.

“My car is here.”

Quynh gets up, smooths down her dress, and walks out the door.

…

Whiskey burns going down.

Quynh feels the burn, but she does not cough. She does not splutter. She should. She does not drink whiskey. She prefers gin.

Yet, here she stands, whiskey on the rocks in one hand and her clutch in another. She pushes herself from the bar, away from the bartender who gives her a strange look, and into the throng of well-dressed business men and women. She will have to bow and scrape to them all night. Perhaps her unlikely choice of drink is logical to numb the insanity.

Her boss flags her down, beckoning her towards the person of the hour.

“Doctor Nguyen, I would like to introduce you to Mr. Steven Merrick.” Steven Merrick is a tall, thin man with birdlike features and a beaky nose to match. He eyes Quynh with devastating scrutiny. “Mr. Merrick, sir, this is Doctor Quynh Nguyen, our most senior research developer on the Prometheus project.”

“A pleasure.” He extends one clammy hand in exchange for Quynh’s.

“Steven Merrick in the flesh. I must say it is an honor,” Quynh says, even if she doesn’t mean it. It isn’t every day a lowly chemist gets to meet the CEO of their own company.

“From what Mr. Zhao tells me, the honor is mine.” Words are pleasant, but Quynh feels nothing but chills at the sound of his voice.

“I’ve brought my own doctor with me,” he says, gesturing to the austere woman at his side. “This is Doctor Meta Kozac, Head of Research and Development at our London facility. I was hoping you two could put those gorgeous brains together and make something truly incredible.”

“What would you have us make, Mr. Merrick?”

The pair share an unsetting smile. Doctor Kozac pulls something out of her jacket pocket. Something familiar.

A vial of blockers.

The little black pills rattle as Doctor Kozac shakes them. Merrick appears amused, taking Quynh’s horror for confusion.

“We’ve been working on this little number for a while now. Nothing too crazy, just something to help with cognitive function and memory. But I need the best minds we have working on ironing out the kinks. You’re the best, Doctor Nguyen.” He fixes her with those beady, birdlike eyes. She is the prey, cornered with no way out. “Say you’ll do it.”

“Your offer is generous. I’m flattered,” Quynh replies, carefully as to not get eaten alive. “May I have time to consider?”

“Of course.” Merrick backs off with surprising ease. He stuffs his hands in jacket pockets, rocks back on the heels of shoes too expensive to abuse in such a manner. “I’ll have my assistant send over the necessary documents.”

“Thank you.”

The pair walk off, parting the crowds as they go. A couple of gods.

Quynh exhales. Her body shakes. Whatever her boss says, whatever abuse about not immediately accepting Merrick’s offer he spews, falls on deaf ears.

She needs another whiskey.

She needs -

_\- Andromache?_

“Dance with me?”

Quynh stares at the offered hand. She knows that hand, has felt that hand on her skin. Yet, in this moment, it is alien. Just as alien as Andromache in her bloodstained clothes in the middle of this ballroom, asking her to dance.

"I wasn't finished earlier," she says, going nowhere. Quynh's silence only fuels her determination. "So dance with me, and let me talk."

No is the logical answer. No is the _only_ answer. Somehow, Quynh finds herself stepping onto the dance floor hand in hand with Andromache despite all the warning signs.

Andy is a poor dancer. They end up fumbling a mockery of a waltz, out of time and tempo.

Quynh has never had more fun at a work function in her life.

“I’m sorry for earlier,” Andy says, and isn’t she just full of surprises?

“Oh? For which part?” Quynh asks, purposefully obtuse. She enjoys this, pulling on Andy’s strings, seeing how far she can go before Andy snaps back. “For showing up on my doorstep bleeding, again? For inconveniencing me with your paranoia, again? Or for patronizing me and accusing me of throwing our cluster into turmoil by inciting a ‘lover’s spat’?”

Andy grows more and more frustrated with each accusation.

“All of it, but mostly the last one.”

“Hmmmm I see. And crashing my work is your way of apologizing?”

“I was trying to be…” A frustrated huff, a muttered string of curses. “Fuck it, I don’t know what I was trying.”

Quynh spins out. When Andy pulls her back in, close to her chest, Quynh can feel her heart racing.

“I believe the word you are looking for is romantic.” Andy’s eyes widen. Caught red handed. Quynh would laugh if it would do more good than harm. “I don’t think you have a romantic bone in your body, Andromache. But don’t worry. That’s why I like you.”

Andy’s lips quirk up in a half-smile. All is well.

“I accept your apology.”

They are close now. So close. Close enough that a step forward would remove all space between them. Close enough for Quynh to see that Andy’s eyes are not just blue, but green and grey and all the sea shades in between. Fractured crystals cold and sharp and so very beautiful.

Voices rise and find Quynh’s ears. She steps back, looks around.

“Everyone’s staring.”

The waltz stops. Andy stops. Too late, Quynh remembers why she needed to say no.

Andy is not here.

Quynh stands alone in a crowded ballroom. For the second time, all eyes fall on her. The eyes of her supervisors, her peers, her friends.

The eyes of Doctor Meta Kozac and Steven Merrick.

…

Music pounds through the speakers, into the floor, through Yusuf’s feet, and into his chest. His heart thumps to the rhythm. His entire body buzzes with sound and vodka.

Yusuf is not sure which country he’s in or what time it is. He is not sure how many drinks he’s had or why the room spins. All he is sure of is that this is the best night in many.

Sweat pours off him in waves. He should drink water. He knocks a shot back instead. His shirt is gone, lost in the sea of dancing bodies. He does not mind. He welcomes touch. Craves it.

The hands on him now are calloused and wide. Fingers hold his hips tight enough to bruise, hold him close as they grind to the electronic beat. His partner is hard against his ass, a noticeable presence through two layers of jeans. Yusuf is half hard himself. An expected side effect of clubbing with dangerously handsome strangers.

Yusuf’s been at this for hours now, at least half that time spent with this particular strangers. He’s ready for more.

He’s ready to forget.

A woman leans against the bar. She stares right at Yusuf. Elegant is not enough to describe how she looks in her long red dress, her full face of makeup.

Regal.

Ethereal.

Out of place.

He tells his dance partner he wants a drink. That he will be right back. And then he’s off, headed towards the woman no one but he can see.

She smiles at him, knowing. Disappointed.

“It seems we are both making bad decisions tonight.”

There is only one thing she can mean by that. Yusuf did not come for a lecture.

“I don’t want to talk about Nicolo.”

“No.” Her eyes cast from the man Yusuf dances with, large and gruff and everything Nicolo is not, back to Yusuf. “I suppose you don’t.”

Disapproval rolls off her in waves, but her face betrays nothing. Small fingers wrap around his wrist, delicate but strong.

“Be careful, Yusuf.”

She lets him go before he can reply. Gone between the roaming tide of bodies.

Yusuf wades his way through the waves, until he reaches his partner, right where he left him. Strong and broad and brimming with a dangerous energy that draws Yusuf like a moth to flame.

“Let’s get out of here.”

The man nods. That is another oddity about Yusuf’s partner: he does not speak. Not a word. An oddity, and yet, a welcome reprieve from having to create half-hearted conversation.

The man follows, but Yusuf cannot take him home. Not without one specific bit of information.

“What’s your name?”

Words whispered into the sweat-slicked skin of cheeks, shoulders, necks. Words, as rough as the teeth that scrape across the shell of Yusuf’s ear, jaw, Adam’s apple.

A single word in reply, hard to hear through the growl of want.

“Keane.”

…

Nile stares at a reflection she does not recognize.

Hand to the mirror on the wall, she traces the shape of cheekbones, eyebrows, cupid’s bow. They cannot be hers.

It cannot be her skin, so pale and dry. It cannot be her eyes, so dull and dark. It cannot be her neck, raw and covered in delicate white bandages. She has the urge to rip them off.

The only things that keeps her from doing just that are Jay and Dizzy.

Jay and Dizzy are at Nile’s side day and night. They never let her out of sight out of fear she may disappear again. Nile does not fault them for their fear. It is a valid one. She does not know how she would react if she had to watch one of them bleed out on the street corner.

In these rare moments alone, Nile can reflect on her brush with death. Can ask herself all the questions she cannot answer for Jay or Dizzy.

Jay and Dizzy think she’s hiding something. Jay and Dizzy are right.

She knows she needs to tell them. This cluster thing is not as harmless as it was in the beginning. Things are happening, coincidences stacking up. Andy thinks this attack has purpose. Something to do with pharmaceutical companies and little black pills that go _plink plink plink_ down a storm drain...

She needs to tell them…but how? How could they believe her? And even if they did, how could Nile keep them safe? She couldn’t even keep _herself_ from getting hurt. Couldn’t even kick down a door without breaking her foot. Couldn’t even fire a gun -

Another figure appears over her shoulder.

Nile turns so quickly her hip catches on the edge of the side table. It hurts like a bitch, curses falling from her lips faster than she can catch them.

“Nile, is everything okay?” Jay asks from the kitchen. Her voice carries the same authority as it did when they were just sergeant and soldier, demanding to be obeyed.

“Fine,” she replies as loud as she can without risk of popping stitches.

The man from the hospital, from Yusuf’s sketchpad, from her dreams - _Nicolo_ \- stands in the middle of the room, frozen as a deer in headlights. One move might spook him.

Nile must act slowly, carefully. One step at a time.

“You saved my life.” Another step. Then another. Until they are face to face. “Thank you.”

“Do not thank me,” Nicolo insists, his voice straining with something achingly familiar to guilt. “What I did does not deserve thanks.”

He cannot look her in the eye. That will not do.

Nile takes his hand, pulls him down to the couch so they can speak without fear of falling.

They sit in silence for numerous minutes listening to Jay cooking, Dizzy singing along to music in the living room. It is enough ambient noise to cover a quiet conversation.

“You’re not what I was expecting,” Nile says, takes in the wrinkled cassock, the dark circles underneath clear blue eyes, the grim set of lips. He looks in no better shape than she. “Yusuf painted more of a princess in the tower picture.”

That gets a reaction. Those blue eyes go wide. Lips fall open in a silent ‘oh’.

“You know Yusuf?”

“Yeah. He draws you, you know. Draws all of us, but you’re his favorite.” Nile traces senseless patterns on the cushion, pretends she has an artist’s fingers. And she suppose, in a way, she does. “I recognized you the moment you showed up. That’s why I wasn’t afraid.”

Nicolo looks away, out the window at a beautiful summer day. So much to celebrate. So much to be thankful for.

“What if you should be?”

“You wouldn’t hurt me.” Nile knows that down to the marrow of her bones. She knows he knows that too.

“No,” he relents softly, reluctantly.“Not on purpose.”

“We’re a little fucked in the head. All of us. World’s most dysfunctional cluster.“ Nile spares a laugh at her own joke. Nicky doesn’t laugh, but his eyes go soft around the edge. Nile counts that as a victory.

She takes his hand again, brings it up to her hair. He takes the hint, runs calloused fingers through the kinks and coils of the natural hair she has not had time to style.

“I won’t hurt you on purpose either,” she says. “I’m glad you saved my life.”

Nile does not expect a response.

It it all the sweeter when, fingers in her hair soothing her to sleep, she hears, “I am glad, too.”

…

Booker knows this street.

“You’re close to me.”

“Fuck!” Andy jumps in her seat, swerves, nearly hits oncoming traffic.

That’s new. Andy’s never startled.

“Sorry, Boss.” He points to the people outside, the adverts on the electronic screens. “They’re speaking my language.”

Knuckles on the steering wheel relax, blood rushing back to bone.

“I’ve got a safehouse nearby. Town called Goussainville.”

“Yeah I’ve heard of it.” Run down hole in the wall outside Paris. Abandoned for fifty years due to airplane traffic. Exactly the kind of place that would attract a mercenary trying to lay low. “Didn’t take you for the type to settle down. I was starting to think all you did was sleep on trains and street corners.”

“Screw you, Book.”

She shoves him, but there’s no heat to it. Booker laughs.

“Come on. Something I want to show you.”

She lets him take control, put the car into drive, tear down the nearest street and out of the city.

“Take it you talked to Quynh.” Stilted silence is all the confirmation Booker needs. “How’d that go?”

“She doesn’t think we should trust you.”

Booker whistles through his teeth. “You know how Quynh is. She’s backed into a corner at work, trying to help us at the same time. The stress must be unimaginable. She’s gonna need all of us.”

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.”

Andy is distant. She rubs her hand over her shoulder, winces, lost in thought. Booker doesn’t like it, doesn’t like the shift from her usual sharp self.

It’s really fucking inconvenient.

Their hands brush as Booker shifts gears, pulls off to the side of the road. How strange is it that he can touch a person that isn’t there. Can feel the warmth of worn knuckles under his fingertips. Can feel the savage strength those hands possess. Can feel the danger that runs as an undercurrent.

He’s playing with fire.

“I’m on your side, Andy.”

They park beside a field, wide open yet densely populated. Grass is soft beneath their boots. Water from the river rushes in their ears. Children run, sparklers in hand and laugher in their mouths. Adults lounge in fold-out chairs and picnic blankets, drinks in hand and contentment in their eyes.

Booker brings a blanket of his own, settles on the outskirts of the crowd.

“What is this?”

“Watch.”

On cue, the night sky erupts into a show of color and light. Reds whites and blues illuminate the lines of the city, the sharp relief of _la Tour Eiffel_.

Illuminate memories, however brief, of blond little boys on strong shoulders, full of smiles and so much joy.

Booker pulls out a flash, raises it to Andy.

“ _Bonne Fête Nationale._ ”

Whiskey burns going down. It always does, but especially today. Booker always deals with this sadness, this insidious, malicious thing growing where his heart used to be, on his own.

For the first time, he doesn’t mind the company.

There is so much of it.

Nile lies on the grass, pulls the blades through clenched fingers while another - _Nicolo_ \- runs his fingers through her hair, soothing. They both look up, watch clouds of color rain down upon the masses, and try to find beauty in the violence that sets their nerves on edge.

Quynh ruins her red dress, stains the edges green with still-wet grass. Dark eyes devour every explosion, reflect them back along with a hunger for more.

Joe is missing. Booker feels his absence like a void.

And yet…Booker is content in a way entirely separate from the whiskey. Content in a way he has not felt since the accident. Content with a bond that thrums like a living thing, that takes the joy of his cluster and magnifies it four fold.

_No,_ he thinks as he pockets his flask, sober with regret. _He doesn’t mind the company at all_.


	7. sequoia

Andy’s gonna need more stitches.

Bodies of fallen soldiers lie at her feet. Blood runs like rivers across the floor of the abandoned church. Not the first time she has defiled consecrated ground.

It’s been too long since she’s used a sword. She’s not convinced the memory of a blade in her hand is her own.

Metal falls to the ground, joins the bodies with a damning clang.

The fight is not over.

There is no time to think of the clean up. No time to think about the police who would be on her in a moment. (No one could ignore a grenade, even in an abandoned city).

Panic yanks her across the world.

Street lights assault her vision, creep over the edges of white-washed buildings, illuminate a man with his back turned. A familiar man with a mop of dark curls and silver rings on his fingers.

A stranger stalking that familiar man. 

A stranger with a gun.

Andy does not think. She does not ask permission. She acts.

Disarming the stranger is second nature. Thoughtless. Normally, effortless. But this stranger is strong. Surprisingly so. Unnaturally so.

She goes to crush his wrist. He grabs her and throws her five feet.

Ribs crack upon impact. Breath pushes from burning lungs.

Fuck.

The feral part of Andy’s brain relishes a good fight. Flashes bloody teeth and goes back for more. An animal. A monster.

She likes this new strength. Joe is taller, broader, full of potential. Once she learns the constraints of this body, it is nothing to dodge the stranger’s punch, roll to the ground, sweep his ankles out from under him.

Straddle him and beat the shit out of him.

Punch after punch after punch until that chiseled face vanishes under a layer of blood, black, and blue.

“Fuck,” Joe curses, leans over and braces his hands on his knees. Andy thinks he might throw up. Most unused to violence do. “Did you kill him?”

“I don’t think so. Just knocked out.”

Andy pushes an uncaring hand into his sweaty hair, watches as his skull lulls to the side without resistance. She gets up, brushes her hands on her ruined pants. 

“Want to tell me what’s going on?”

“I don’t know.” Joe pulls his fingers through his hair, reminds himself to breathe. He’s shaking. Processing. “We were at a club, dancing. Said his name was Keane. I wanted to go home without him, he didn’t like that too much. I told him to fuck off and that was that. Or so I thought.”

Simple enough story. One Andy’s heard a dozen times. But it doesn’t sit right, doesn’t add up.

She bends back down, pats at Keane’s pockets. Keys, mace, cash, phone, pack of gum, map of the city.

_Badge_.

“Three triangles.” Andy is so mad she could spit. Of course it would be them. “What is Merrick up to?”

“This is BPO?”

“Looks like it.”

Joe mutters a string of Arabic curses.

“How did they find me?”

Good question. Yusuf moves, the most nomadic of the group, even compared to Andy. Most of the time he isn’t even on land. Tracking him is no small feat…

…Not for a sensate.

Dread settles. Bile rises in her throat.

“You need to get out of here, get far away from that guy. He’s been tracking you, tracking us. You’re not safe.”

Yusuf does not argue. For once, he is fine with taking orders.

One less to worry about.

“Where are you going?” he asks, brows furrowed.

“To warn the others.”

…

The roses are dying.

Nicolo tries everything he can think to get them to retain their soft, silken quality. All he succeeds in is creating a carpet of petals at his feet.

Everything falls apart in the end.

“There is conflict within you.”

Brother Frattaroli. Nicolo stops wondering how he manages to find him. Nicolo stopped wondering a long time ago. They are attuned to one another in a way that baffles. In a way that makes Nicolo wonder…

“There is always conflict within me.”

Fingers brush back overgrown leaves. Another petal falls.

“More so than usual.” The bench creaks as Brother Frattaroli sits at Nicolo’s side. “Speak to me, Nicolo. What bothers you?”

“Coming here was a mistake.” _In more ways than one,_ goes unsaid. “Darkness follows wherever I go. I thought I could outrun it…I was wrong, and now the entire monastery will suffer.”

Brother Frattaroli hums in thought.

“Yes. You have made a mistake, but it was not coming here. Your mistake is choosing to run yet again.” Nicolo’s jaw drops. He has become used to Brother Frattaroli’s blunt manner of speech, but this is an unprecedented directness. Brother Frattaroli’s gaze is unwavering in its conviction. “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”

Nicolo is in no mood, no head space to be lectured. Temper flares, hot and bright.

“What would you have me do? Fight off an army? Endanger the lives of the brothers - endanger you?”

Brother Frattaroli is not so easily cowed. He remains calm while Nicolo, always Nicolo, gives into his vices.

“Do not disguise cowardice with concern. Everyone under this roof has put their lives in God’s hands, something you have never been able to understand.” Brother Frattaroli pauses, takes a breath. The steel leaves his eyes. He is gentler than before. “If you search your heart, you will find fear of our destruction is not the true source of your struggle. What you fear, Nicolo, is that once you put yourself in the line of fire, once you reclaim your sword, you will never stop.”

Thinks of a life always hunted, always hunting. Thinks of a life of uncertainty, of shifting loyalty and bloodshed. Thinks of a life of impossible highs.

Thinks of a life that ends in an impossible low, body buried in an unmarked grave. Unwanted. Unloved.

Nicolo runs his fingers over the crucifix on his neck, soft wood worn smooth save for one distinct divot.

“That is not what God would want.”

“Who are we to determine God’s will?” Brother Frattaroli challenges in that calm, collected way. A hand rests on Nicolo’s shoulder, heavy with truths to which Nicolo does not care to listen. “God is not your shepherd, Nicolo. He is your scapegoat.”

Words sting sharp with the truth, sharper than any blade. Nicolo is familiar with that sting. Intimately. It does not mean the pain is any less fresh, fresher still when delivered by the hands of a man Nicolo considers friend.

Friendship keeps Nicolo from denying Brother Frattaroli. Shame opens his ears. Truth cuts him to the core, bleeds him to the marrow.

“Ever since your arrival, you have struggled and suffered. Those that come here seek a life of peace, yet you see peace as a prison. A life of devotion is not a life suited to you.”

Nicolo knows this, of course. Knows and denies it time and time again. He fools no one, transparent as glass.

Brother Frattaroli sighs. “Some men are born to the cloth. Some men are born to the sword. There is no shame in it.”

Too far.

Nicolo turns his head away.

“There is plenty of shame in what I’ve done.”

Shame is all he knows. How can he be anything other than shameful? All the red in his ledger. All the lives he has ruined. All the years he played God. All the years he can never give back, no matter how many prayers fall from these shameful, blasphemous lips.

Even now, shame follows him. The brothers are in danger because of him. The cluster is in danger become of him. Yusuf is in danger because of him.

The hand on his shoulder squeezes once.

“So feel that shame. _Embrace it_. Then let it go. Forge a better path. Do some good.” Such simple words. Could it really be that easy? “Your cluster needs you. Perhaps protecting them is your calling.”

The blood in Nicolo’s veins runs cold.

_Cluster._

“You know.”

“Of course. Why do you think I have spent so much time trying to guide you?” Brother Frattaroli swats at Nicolo, his touch warm with something Nicolo has been unable to name until now. “Like recognizes like.”

Now, Nicolo sees the invisible network of time and space, neurons and pathways linking his mind to the brother beside him. All those times Brother Frattaroli found him when he wished to be lost, all those times Nicolo felt as though Brother Frattaroli was the only one who could understand him. Not coincidence, but _connection_.

It is beautiful. It is all-consuming.

How did he manage to ignore it before?

“Then you are in danger,” Nicolo says as the wonder fades and reality rears her ugly head. “You must leave.”

“No. I must stay with the monastery. It is as much as part of me as I am a part of it.” There is truth to that, intrinsic and unbreakable, that prevents further argument. Brother Frattaroli does not appear worried. He does not fear what is to come. Nicolo latches onto that calm, that assuredness. It passes to him as that large, familiar hand shakes sense into him. “Your home resides elsewhere. Go to them.”

Whatever restraints to which Nicolo clings, whatever excuses with which he paves his hesitance, fall away. There is only the knowledge that his cluster is out there, defenseless and scattered.

They need him. He needs them.

Nicolo rises from the bench, brushes his cassock of spare leaves. This is the last time he will sit in this garden. This is the last time will wear this cloth.

The knowledge does not scare him anymore.

Nicolo stops under the archway, turns and drinks in the sight of Brother Frattaroli for the last time.

“We will not see each other again.”

“Save your goodbyes, ye of little faith,” Brother Frattaroli chuckles and shakes his head, as if Nicolo misses yet another lesson. “I am already gone.”

And he is, lost in the swirling wind of rose petals.

…

The summons arrives the moment Quynh steps into the building. The notification pings her inbox, the subject line a time and place. The simplicity of it marks the importance.

Quynh forsakes her office. Inside the elevator, she hits the button for the top floor and tries not to think about the irregularity of her heartbeat.

Floors blink past and the doors do not open. A rarity. An impossibility.

Quynh casts a glance to the cameras in the ceiling. She will not be caught as weak.

Doors open. Her grip on her purse tightens. Heels click on the floor as she walks down the silent hall, two men in suits following close behind, ghosts.

Glass doors open, the board room turns to greet her. Not that beady eyes have not been watching her procession with mild curiosity. She has never sat at this table, long and mahogany and flanked with leather-backed chairs full of men. No women. The sexist bastards.

At the head of the table sits Steven Merrick. His smile widens when he sees Quynh. It is not a comfort.

One ghost gestures for Quynh to sit at the opposite head. A seat of honor. The suspicion mounts. From her seat she can see something odd in the corner, something out of place: a large chest made of metal. It stands against the glass walls, the pale floors, the fragile decor. Quynh does not like it, does not know its meaning.

Another ghost pours a glass of water. No one speaks. Quynh reaches for it. She will not be the first to speak.

Fingers close around her wrist, strong, insistent.

“You need to get out of here,” Andromache says with an urgency Quynh cannot ignore. “You need to run.”

Steven Merrick speaks at the same time. “Doctor Nguyen, thank you for meeting us at such short notice.”

Quynh is careful not to speak aloud. There is nothing that can be done about her staring into space as she hisses at Andy, “This is hardly the time - “

“They know,” Andromache bowls over Quynh’s complaints, stubborn as a mule. Her face is drawn in lines of panic. Quynh can feel that panic in the irregular beat of her heart, the sweat breaking down her neck. “My safe house is compromised. BPO is after us, and they’re getting bold. You need to get somewhere safe.”

“What is this about?” Quynh asks aloud. She keeps her tone pleasant, unsuspicious. Then, to her current nuisance, “You have many enemies, Andromache. Perhaps it was someone else who compromised your safe house.”

“I gave you a proposition. Now, I want an answer.”

The blockers, Quynh thinks, much to Andy’s horror.

“You are playing with fire.”

“Will you help me?” Merrick asks, hands braced on either side of the table. All eyes are on her, much like they were on the dance floor. The room, already silent, plunges into a quiet so loud Quynh can hear her every breath.

“Whatever they are planning, I can learn so much more from the inside. You know this.”

Quynh tells herself she is justified. This is a logical plan. This is worth the risk.

“I can’t let you do this.”

“I wasn’t asking.”

Hands slam on the mahogany. The glass of water vibrates, drops running down the sides. There will be a ring on the table. Ruined.

“Doctor Nguyen, your answer, please.”

Another woman walks into the room, tall and pale and blonde. A vampire. She stands by Merrick’s side, nose turned toward the ceiling.

Andy pales.

“You recognize her?” Quynh asks.

“She’s the one who tried to cut Nile’s brain open.”

Doctor Kozac eyes Quynh like a hawk does a squirrel, eyes just as cruel and dark. She looks at her watch, whispers something to Merrick.

Andy scrambles at the papers in front of her, digging through the file folder until she finds what she is looking for: a piece of company-issue stationary, three blue triangles printed center top.

Andy’s eyes are blue when she begs, “Quynh get out of here now!”

The mood changes. Merrick knows.

Ghosts grab Quynh by the arms. By the elbow, waist, and ankle. All points are engulfed by touch. Possessive. Aggressive. They pull her from her chair, drag her across the room, towards the sinister box made of stainless steel. She sees it now for what it is:

A coffin.

Quynh thrashes, knocks over her glass. Crystal shatters as it meets marble floors. Water drips, puddles, flows.

A sea of sadness. Quynh drowns.

There is no thrill this time, no breath to break the surface. There is only fear. Fear and pain from the bruising grip of soulless specters, the sting of sharp needles, the sinking dread of life on the other end of a microscope.

“Andromache!” Quynh shrieks as the chains lock in place. “Andromache!”

It is dark except for a single slat wide enough to see clear eyes blown wide with desperation and rage…and tears.

So…Andromache can cry.

Andromache…

Already, the blockers kick in, the sedatives and paralytics. It is too much to scream. Too much to fight.

Her voice haunts, echoing off the walls of her metal prison.

_Andromache._

_Andromache._

…

Booker stands along the Seine, feet falling perilously close to the edge. He feels the urge to jump, this dark and all-consuming impulse to fall. He has already fallen so far from grace. What is a little further?

The bookshop lies a few streets away. It sits unattended. Buying more whiskey takes precedence over selling first editions. Whiskey burns but does not trap. Not like the four walls of an overstuffed shop.

Why, Booker thinks, does he spend so much time in a cage of his own making?

The bookshop did not always feel like a prison. A cage. A coffin.

Water ripples as ducks carve paths along the surface. Jean-Pierre used to love the ducks, used to beg his Papa to feed them stale bread in a time long before the bookshop.

“They have the scientist.”

Memories will have to wait. Copley demands attention.

Booker knows the price for his decision. This is expected. So why does it send Booker’s heart to the bottom of the Seine?

“Quynh.”

“There was nothing I could do.” Remorse fills Copley’s face. Dread paints a morose picture.

Booker sees.

He stands in a board room, elegant and sharp. Men in suits clear out, heads bowed low. Only two men stand face to face, caught in a battle of wills.

Horrible things happened here. Horrible, recent things. He hears phantom screams. They echo off the walls, down the halls, from the bottom of the Seine.

_Andromache. Andromache._

Copley stands in front of Merrick as he stands by Booker’s side. Two places at once, one visible one not.

“This was not part of the plan,” Copley says, out loud. He stares into Steven Merrick’s dead, remorseless eyes. Watches that crooked smile reveal sharp, snaggled teeth.

“Plans change.”

A snap of fingers. A guard lurches forward and punches Copley in the gut. He crumples, a useless heap on the ground. Booker feels the punch as his own.

For the first time, Booker is truly helpless.

Copley croaks from fetal position, eyes red and wretched. “You know what they will do next.”

Booker doesn’t need it spelled out. He nods, once. There are no words.

What could he possibly say to make this right?

Feet take him away from this place. He walks away from shattered glasses and pools of water on marble floors. Walks away from screams and supplications.

Walks into a garden. Light streams through the open courtyard, warms old stone pavers. A priest sits on a bench, tends to the few precious roses.

They are wilting. Dying. The irony is not lost.

Booker steps forward and falls to his knees.

“Forgive me.”

Nicolo looks at Booker with heavy eyes.

He knows. He sighs.

“What good is God’s forgiveness when you have not forgiven yourself?”

...

Steam fills the bathroom, fogs the mirror. Lavender fills the gaps.Baths are supposed to be relaxing, but Nile is tense under the warm water. She feels raw, her brain a giant exposed nerve. Temples throb at the influx of feeling too much, too quickly.

Something is happening. Something she cannot see. The steam is too thick.

She rises from the tub, dripping a path to the sink. Cold water to cut the warm, refreshing and sharp, hits her face.

_Wake up,_ Nile tells herself. _Wake up._

Nile looks up to find her reflection is not her own.

Quynh’s face contorts with pain, mouth wide open and screaming. Her fingers claw at the mirror, nails breaking under such force.

Nile _feels_.

Pressure in her lungs, burning bright and sharp, demanding to be fed.

She can’t breathe. She can’t -

Hands fly to her throat, scramble over white bandages, claw at the fastening.

_Too tight, too tight, too tight_.

Nile stumbles, slips on the carpet. Her knees take the brunt of the fall. She knocks over the tissue box on the way down, pink ceramic shattering as it touches the tile.

The following footsteps come immediately. Jay must be waiting for her outside.

“Nile!” Jay shouts.

Nile tries to smile, but can’t. She can’t - _she can’t breathe_.

“Nile!” Jay shouts again, more panicked. Dizzy is there as well, Nile can feel it, can hear their worried whispers but none of the words make sense.

Images make sense. Flashes of something far away: a house on a hill, the waves rough in a storm, banging against the windows, hilly meadows of sweet green grass, little girls laughing with flower crowns in braided hair.

The door creaks. Wood splinters under the force of determined fists. It is no match for Jay’s rage nor Dizzy’s persistence. The door falls from its hinges, bangs to the ground, and Nile’s loves fall to their knees at her side.

_Thank God we don’t have roommates,_ Nile thinks and laughs.

Laughs. She can breathe again.

She laughs out loud. Jay and Dizzy share a look, bewildered. They must think Nile has lost her mind. Perhaps she has.

Nile looks at the mirror. It reflects the shower curtain, bright and obnoxious as the day Dizzy purchased it. Quynh is gone, but not for long.

“Malta,” Nile says, the only sane thought that floats to the surface. Fields and flowers and fantasy. “I have to go to Malta.”

“You need to go back to the doctor,” Dizzy says. Her tone is short. She’s not in the mood to fight. “Fuck. You could have a concussion.”

“No. No doctors,” Nile insists. Not safe. Doctors are not safe.

“Babe, you’re freaking us out,” Jay says, brings a tissue to Nile’s neck to stop the bleeding. She must have pulled her stitches. “What’s going on?”

“It’s…” Nile starts, bites her tongue.

Jay and Dizzy need to know. They’ve done so much, been through so much. It’s what they deserve. And yet…will they believe her? It’s one thing to have a medical diagnosis attached to this insanity. But to spin a tale of science fiction? To suggest that she is anything other than human?

“I need to go to Malta,” she says again. “I know this sounds crazy, that I’m acting crazy, but there is someone out there, someone close to me, who is in a lot of trouble. She needs me.”

There is a million things Jay and Dizzy could say. That Nile could barely take care of herself. That PTSD and a neck wound make her a liability. That this is all in her head.

None of those things come.

Instead, Dizzy takes a deep breath. “And she’s in Malta?”

“No, but the people who can help her are.”

Jay and Dizzy exchange another look. Nile knows this look: the same look they used to share before walking into certain death, sand and sweat and blood on their boots.

Nothing but the three of them against the world, now and forever.

“Okay,” Dizzy says, looks Nile dead in the eye. She sees nothing but absolute trust. “But we’re coming with you.”

…

Despite his good intentions, Yusuf is not a soldier.

A soldier aims for survival. A soldier follows orders.

Yusuf wants to find the nearest freighter and jump into the vast Mediterranean, out the Strait of Gibraltar and into the awaiting Atlantic. Yusuf years for the far corners of the world. Cape of Good Hope to Greenland to Guam. The whole world waits at the bow of a ship.

Yusuf is not a good soldier. He runs for pleasure, not for purpose.

There is no pleasure in this: sitting in a crowded train station, baseball cap weighing his curls to his sweated scalp. Pain radiates through his ribs. He needs a doctor. Andy will kill him if he goes, even if the injuries are her fault.

Andy bursts back into his periphery, a raging fire.

“They have Quynh,” Andy says as she paces, madness taking hold of soldier’s steel. “They just took her, th-they grabbed her and locked her up like she was nothing, like she - !”

“Andy!” Yusuf snaps, his own frustration getting the better of him. “We need to focus.”

“Don’t you see?” She spits back, angry not at him but at the circumstance. “They have Quynh. They know. That means we’re next. We’re not safe.”

“They already tried to go after Nile. They sent soldiers to kill me. G.I. Joe over here nearly killed you. Quynh is...” Andy trails off, balls her hands into fists. “She was right about Booker. I never should have trusted him, fucking sell out. Of course no one has gone after him. He’s probably orchestrated this whole goddamn thing. That only leaves - “

“Nicolo.”

The streets of Ibiza fade. Andy and Yusuf both stand on the roof of a monastery, the countryside of Genova sprawling before them, close enough to the sea that the smell of salt and brine dredge up memories of the first time Yusuf met Nicolo.

Yusuf refuses to think this is the last.

Nicolo stands with hands braced on the low ledge, staring out into the distance.

“I saw the cars come up the drive. Three blue triangles,” he says, his tone betraying none of the fear Yusuf feels running under his skin, the electric current of a live wire. Nicolo does not meet their eyes as he turns, raises his right hand to display a familiar vial. “These were in the mail this afternoon. I can only assume the meaning.”

“Fuck,” Andy spits, kicks the ground. “When I get my hands on these bastards - “

There is no time for Andy’s misplaced violence. Yusuf rushes forward, still too far away.

“Nicolo, please. You must go.”

Yusuf will fall to his knees and beg if that is what it takes. Even though Nicolo rejects him, even though Nicolo will not love him, Yusuf will not stop trying. Yusuf will not let him die.

“I have spent my whole life running. No more.” The cloister bells start to ring, signaling the beginning of the end. Out of time. Nicolo does not flinch. “I will stay and I will fight.”

Stupid, stupid man!

“Are you really so selfish as to put yourself in danger? To put us all in danger?” Yusuf spits, temper flaring hot, bright and burning for a second, and then fizzles. “You are not just yourself anymore, Nicolo. What happens to you…if anything happens to you…it will happen to all of us.”

Nicolo has the most beautiful eyes, beautiful and sad. Yusuf does not realize how deep they are until this moment. Not until they fill with grief and regret decades old.

Nicolo knows. He knows all too well. Whatever keeps him here, he knows the risk, and it eats him alive.

Yusuf wants to know, wants desperately to understand.

_What will it take?_ Yusuf asks in wordless plea. _What will it take for you to share you burden? What will it take to let me in?_

Andy does not argue, not like Yusuf. She is not pleased, lips vanished in a thin line as she bites her tongue. But she understands this insane need of Nicolo’s. Yusuf feels the sympathy roll off her.

“There’s a safe house in Malta,” Andy says in lieu of a fight. “We’re all headed there. Meet us there, soon as you can.”

There is no need to share an address, not when they see the exact location in Andy’s pristine memory.

“All?” Nicolo asks with an arch of his brow.

“It’s a work in progress.”

Nicolo’s lips curl up around the corners, smile barely there. It is the sweetest sight Yusuf has ever seen. He cannot help himself.

“Nicolo - “

Andy’s hand on Yusuf’s bicep keeps him from entering Nicolo’s personal space.

“Let him go, Joe. Nicky can handle himself, can’t you Nicky?”

Nicolo cocks his head at the nickname. Yusuf can’t be bothered to correct Andy’s habit this time. Not when Nicolo is walking into slaughter with arms wide open.

Yusuf takes Nicolo’s hand, so warm for someone who stands a world apart. Nicolo does not push Yusuf away. He holds on tighter, Yusuf’s hand a life line.

“I will see you in Malta,” Nicolo says with a conviction Yusuf envies. “And I promise, then, I will explain everything.”

“I’ll be very upset if you don’t.”The joke falls flat, humor lost in the void of Yusuf’s despair.

For a moment, one shining moment, Yusuf thinks Nicolo may kiss him.

Then, Nicolo lets his hand slide from Yusuf’s, takes a step back. He pops the cap to the vial of blockers and does something so reckless Yusuf wants to pull his hair out: Nicolo swallows one whole.

“Malta,” Nicolo says once more.

Then he is gone, Genova replaced with the streets of Ibiza.

“He’ll be fine. He has to be,” Andy says, as if the more times she says it the truer it becomes.

_He’s just a priest!_ Yusuf wants to scream. _A foolish, foolish priest._

There is no point, not when Andy can read his mind as easily as his lips.

“He’s not what you think he is.” She shoulders a backpack, rust-colored stains on the handles. “Come on. We have a lot of road to cover.”

As if they stand on the same ground. As if, when she turns her back to him, she does not leave as well.

No matter. Yusuf knows where he must go.

Forward to his love. Forward to Malta.


End file.
